A new sensor for the assessment of personal exposure to volatile organic compounds

CHENG CHEN; KATHERINE DRIGGS CAMPBELL; INDIRA NEGI; RODRIGO A IGLESIAS; PATRICK OWENS; NONGJIAN TAO; FRANCIS TSOW; ERICA FORZANI

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2012 vol. 54 p. 679 - 679

o improve our understanding of indoor and outdoor personal exposures to common environmental toxicants released into the environment, new technologies that can monitor and quantify the toxicants anytime anywhere are needed. This paper presents a wearable sensor to provide such capabilities. The sensor can communicate with a common smart phone and provides accurate measurement of volatile organic compound concentration at a personal level in real-time, providing environmental toxicants data every three minutes. The sensor has high specificity and sensitivity to aromatic, alkyl, and chlorinated hydrocarbons with a resolution as low as 4 parts-per-billion (ppb), with a detection range of 4 ppbe 1000 ppm (parts-per-million). The sensor’s performance was validated using Gas Chromatography and Selected Ion Flow Tube e Mass Spectrometry reference methods in a variety of environments and activities with overall accuracy higher than 81% (r 2 > 0.9). Field tests examined person