TEMPE, AZ — Behind the doors of the Walton Center for Planetary Health at Arizona State University stands a body that is testing how humans deal with the sizzling summer heat, but it isn't a regular body.
Its name is ANDI. It's the first ever breathing, sweating and walking manikin that can be outdoors and endure extreme heat.
Konrad Rykaczewski, an associate professor at ASU and principal investigator for the project, says ANDI does everything thermally a human being does.
"With ANDI, we can put it in a situation and try its core temperature to the point where we couldn't with a person," said Rykaczewski.
Equipped with 35 zones, where sensors are attached to help simulate things like temperature, ANDI reacts like a human would.
However, not every human reacts the same way.
Neither does ANDI, according to associate Professor Jennifer Vanos.
"We're able to better understand the diversity of responses in the population," she added.
ANDI will also be accompanied by MaRTy which measures heat outside the human body.
"They have to go hand in hand because we can understand what's going on inside ANDI without understanding what the environmental contributions are," said Vanos.
For three months ANDI has been kept in a climate-controlled chamber but this week it'll take its first steps in the Valley.
The project is set to last for the next four summers.
