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This robot quickly disinfects spaces using UV-C light

It neutralizes around 90% of surface microorganisms.

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Abrar Al-Heeti Video producer / CNET
Abrar Al-Heeti is a video host and producer for CNET, with an interest in internet trends, entertainment, pop culture and digital accessibility. Before joining the video team, she was a writer for CNET's culture team. She graduated with bachelor's and master's degrees in journalism from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Though Illinois is home, she now loves San Francisco -- steep inclines and all.
Expertise Abrar has spent her career at CNET breaking down the latest trends on TikTok, Twitter and Instagram, while also reporting on diversity and inclusion initiatives in Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Credentials
  • Named a Tech Media Trailblazer by the Consumer Technology Association in 2019, a winner of SPJ NorCal's Excellence in Journalism Awards in 2022 and has three times been a finalist in the LA Press Club's National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Awards.
Abrar Al-Heeti
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This robot helps keep areas like warehouses clean. 

Alyssa Pierson/CSAIL

Disinfecting spaces such as warehouses is especially critical during the COVID-19 pandemic, but doing so while keeping workers safe can be challenging. So MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory came up with a solution: use a robot that employs UV-C light to disinfect surfaces and neutralize aerosolized forms of coronavirus. 

Through a collaboration with Ava Robotics and the Greater Boston Food Bank, CSAIL mounted a custom UV-C lamp on an Ava Robotics mobile robot base. The lamp neutralizes around 90% of surface microorganisms, according to CSAIL. The robot is initially operated by a remote user and subsequently works autonomously, and can disinfect 4,000 square feet of warehouse space in half an hour. 

The robot works when people aren't around, which is good given that UV-C light, though effective at killing viruses and bacteria on surfaces and aerosols, isn't safe for human exposure. Virus-killing light machines have also been used to disinfect airplanes and hospitals

Researchers say the robot could someday be used in other places such as schools and grocery stores. 

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Watch this: Virus-killing light machines disinfecting airplanes and hospitals