The basis of the current CARES project (Communities Actively Researching Exposure Study) headed by Erin Haynes, from Environmental Health Department of UC is that environmental health research should be carried out with a community and not just on a community.
This study is a tie-up between the community, UC and the Marietta College for observing the air pollution and its effects on health in children, with a focus on heavy metal manganese in the Southeast Ohio region.
To complement this study, Ian Papautsky, an Engineering Associate Professor at UC along with William Heineman, a Chemistry Professor have created a lab-on-a-chip sensor for the measurement of heavy metals. Haynes took them on as partners for developing the first lab-on-a-chip sensor, which would help researchers to measure the amount of manganese in human beings rapidly with just a few drops of blood. This sensor is said to be made from eco-friendly components and is low-cost and disposable.
Papautsky has revealed that the working electrode in the sensor was made from a thin film of bismuth rather than mercury, which is more common and equally harmful to both the environment and humans. Haynes has revealed that currently they had to process the samples in batches of 50, which resulted in the study participants getting their test results after several months of waiting. However, with the help of the Manganese sensor, the results could be obtained in just a few minutes and the participants could be informed of them on the same day, thereby easing them of their anxiety and also speeding up the data collection process.
In 2012, the sensor is to be ready for the first field testing. It would be tested for effectiveness and safety on available human blood samples before being used in the CARES study. CARES is still trying to recruit children aged 7-9 in the Washington, Guernsey and Wood Counties for the study.
Source: http://eh.uc.edu/cares/study/index.html