Scitech Airon 

Scitech Airon 

Part of: GS Prelims and GS-III – Science and technology 

In News: 

• A technology, titled Scitech Airon, has been developed by an incubatee company of Scitech Park, Pune. 
• It offers an effective solution for India’s fight against COVID-19. 

Key takeaways:

• The technology reduces the viral load of infected areas within a room significantly within an hour.  
• It has been developed under the NIDHI PRAYAS program initiated by the Department of Science and Technology (DST).
• It helps to control the virus, bacteria, and fungal infections in a closed environment. 
• It would help in ensuring wellbeing of the staff, doctors, and nurses working in the quarantine facilities by enhancing their disease resistance power and ability to fight the virus. 
• DST has released Rs 1 crore to manufacture and scale up the product. 
• The technology has been scientifically tested by various globally renowned labs in different types of closed environments. 

Important value additions:

NIDHI PRAYAS program

• National Initiative for Developing and Harnessing Innovations (NIDHI) is an umbrella programme conceived and developed by the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India, for nurturing ideas and innovations (knowledge-based and technology-driven) into successful start-ups.
• Under this initiative, DST has launched NIDHI- Promoting and Accelerating Young and ASpiring innovators & startups (NIDHI-PRAYAS) program. 
• The program caters to idea-stage entrepreneurs with a physical product offering. 
• It would also facilitate the innovators with the Physical infrastructure, Technical Guidance, Business Mentorship etc.