Aman Patel

Projects

Research Direction: Protecting people when the outdoors is infectious

Example projects (to be further refined with mentees):

• Developing a curated, comprehensive data bank on the filtration efficiency of improvised filters and fan curves of common household fans

• Crafting high-level specifications to guide the design of open-source equipment: meltblown polypropylene manufacturing lines, ultra-low-cost particle counters, improvised barrier PPE

• Red-teaming various protocols for improvising cleanrooms inside homes

• Designing tabletop exercises on environment-to-human scenarios for business continuity officers, emergency managers, and other key stakeholders

What I'm looking for in a Mentee

The best fits for this workstream will be:

• Scrappy and resourceful: good at finding and vetting ideas from atypical sources, have instincts to rapidly prototype and test things themselves

• Technically literate: comfortable with quickly skimming academic papers and quickly orienting to new technical areas (e.g. aerosol physics)

• Flexible: willing to pivot quickly as the project progresses based on findings or changes in strategic direction

What I’m like as a Mentor

At the start, we’ll iterate together on a project scope that is achievable but directly targets an open question or gap in environment-to-human bioresilience. Over the research period, I like to give quick rounds of async feedback alongside regular check-in calls. I also try to be quite accessible on Signal for rapid questions!

Bio

I’m a Senior Program Associate on Coefficient Giving’s biosecurity team, focusing on physical protections from environment-to-human pathogen scenarios (like a mirror bacteria scenario). I was previously at Blueprint Biosecurity, a pandemic preparedness nonprofit, working on advancing airborne transmission suppression technology like glycol vapors.