Watch Out Swine Flu, Chicago Now Has the Bra Mask

Ladies, your bra just became a life-saving device. 

(Insert joke here.)

Elena Bodnar and her bra mask

Thanks to Elena Bodnar, director of University of Chicago’s newly formed Trauma Risk Management Research Institute,  your bra can become a protective mask.  

In a James Bond-esque manner the bra converts to a gas mask. But in practical terms it might more aptly protect anyone worried about the H1N1 flu virus or even a house fire.

I can see it now, Victoria Secret latest’s line: bra mask and lace.

For her efforts, Bodnar, along with Dr. Raphael Lee and Sandra Marijan, scientific researchers who assisted Bodnar, were recently awarded at Harvard the 2009 Ig Nobel Public Health Prize  by Improbable Research.

(Think of it as the Jim Carrey of Nobel awards.)

 Ten awards are given out for real research for achievements that “makes people laugh and then think.”

Dr. Elena Bodnar demonstrates her invention, assisted by Nobel laureates Wolfgang Ketterle (left), Orhan Pamuk, and Paul Krugman (right). PHOTO: Alexey Eliseev.

Bodnar, a Ukrainian native who lives in Hinsdale, Ill., came up with the idea after studying the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear plant. She’d dealt with the nuclear aftermath as a medical student in the Ukraine.

According to the University of Chicago Medical Center’s Science Life Blog post by John Easton, Bodnar and Lee, from the university’s electrical trauma program, were researching how to help the United States prepare for any potential terrorist “dirty bomb” threats. They were already working on a World Health Organization (WHO) project to study the Soviets’ public health response to similar challenges after the Chernobyl meltdown.

 Their pivotal findings:

The 600,000 workers who cleaned up after that event had no more radiation-linked disease, according to WHO data, than unexposed controls.

Why? Because they limited their exposures and wore masks to prevent inhaling radioactive particulates–standard practice.

They realized, a well-designed mask would filter out “aersol particulates”  hence saving time and lives.

(Think of all the problems after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.)

While Lee and Bodnar were preparing a proposal about their findings for the Office of Homeland Security, Sandra Marijan, a project assistant for Lee, made the simple but astute observation: bras (more specifically post-reconstructive surgery bras) look a lot like two sugerical masks tied together.   

The Bra Mask

So Lee and Bodnar created the proper filtration and fitting, while Bodnar and Marijan designed a bra that could split into two cup masks and be removed without taking your shirt off.

Thus the bra mask was born, on August 14, 2007, U.S. patent #7,255,627

So what’s next?

Scuba diving regulators from a string bikini?