Speaking-Induced Charge-Laden Face Masks with Durable Protectiveness and Wearing Breathability

Face masks, which serve as personal protection equipment, have become ubiquitous for combating the ongoing COVID-19. However, conventional electrostatic-based mask filters are disposable and short-term effective with high breathing resistance, causing respiratory ailments and massive consumption (129 billion monthly), intensifying global environmental pollution. In an effort to address these challenges, the introduction of a piezoelectric polymer was adopted to realize the charge-laden melt-blown via the melt-blowing method. The charge-laden melt-blown could be applied to manufacture face masks and to generate charges triggered by mechanical and acoustic energy originated from daily speaking. Through an efficient and scalable industrial melt-blown process, our charge-laden mask is capable of overcoming the inevitable electrostatic attenuation, even in a high-humidity atmosphere by long-wearing (prolonging from 4 to 72 h) and three-cycle common decontamination methods. Combined with outstanding protective properties (PM2.5 filtration efficiency >99.9%), breathability (differential pressure <17 Pa/cm2), and mechanical strength, the resultant charge-laden mask could enable the decreased replacement of masks, thereby lowering to 94.4% of output masks worldwide (∼122 billion monthly) without substituting the existing structure or assembling process.