High School Junior Will Present Two Scientific Abs

Newswise — In many ways, Otana Jakpor is typical of thousands of researchers who present their studies at the annual American Thoracic Society's International Conference.

Most choose a research question or problem that they can relate to, either professionally or personally. Most hope to find answers that will help people who suffer from pulmonary, critical care or sleep disorders. And most are looking forward to discussing their work at the conference with colleagues the world over who might provide insights that will, in turn, suggest new avenues of research.

What is atypical about Otana is that she is a junior at Woodcrest Christian High School, in Riverside, California, and that she is presenting research that she conducted herself, not with colleagues in a laboratory or patient-care setting.

Otana, who will be the youngest researcher presenting at the conference, will present two abstracts during the International Conference, which is being held from May 15 to 20, in San Diego. One abstract describes an experiment to see whether drug-store bought artificial nails affect pulse oximetry's ability to measure accurately oxygen saturation in the blood through one's fingers. The second reports on the health effects of air and food purifiers that produce ozone.

The results of the first experiment demonstrated that artificial finger nails, even when coated with various colors of finger nail polish, do not interfere with the medical measurement.

The results of the second experiment demonstrated a serious medical consequence, which was of particular interest to Otana, because her mother has severe asthma, and they live in the county with the highest ozone levels in the country. Her research on ozone-generating purifiers also captured the attention of science educators, public health officials and the media.

In three separate experiments—one with a room air purifier, another with a personal air purifier worn around one's neck, and the third with a food purifier—Otana found that concentrations from the devises were 15 times, 9 times and 3 times higher, respectively, than the level of outdoor ozone needed to trigger the most serious (a Stage 3) smog alert, in California.

A two-hour-long exposure to the room air purifier resulted in statistically significant diminished lung function for those with obstructive lung disease (either asthma or COPD), but not for a control group with normal lung function. The mean decrease among those with obstructive lung disease was 11 percent as measured by FEV1/FVC, a common measurement of lung function.

A three-hour-long exposure to the personal air purifier led to statistically significant diminished lung function among the entire group of 9.6 percent, as well as a reduction among the obstructive lung disease subset of 22.8 percent.

The food purifier resulted in a statistically significant diminished lung function among the entire study group of 4.2 percent and 9.6 percent among the obstructive subset.

Otana's ozone study has resulted in numerous honors and awards, including being named a 2008 Outstanding Young Scientist Finalist by the California Association of Professional Scientists, a gold medal in medicine from the Los Angeles NAACP ACT-SO competition and a South Coast Air Quality Management District Clean Air Award.

She also won the President's 2008 Environmental Youth Award for the Environmental Protection Agency's Region 9 (California, Arizona, Nevada and Hawaii), an award she received from then President Bush during a Rose Garden Ceremony.

More importantly, Otana testified about her research before the California Clean Air Resources Board, which was empowered by the state's legislature to set the legal limits for the amount of ozone air purifiers/cleaners could produce. The limits, which began being phased in last fall, are the first in the nation to regulate these devices that produce indoor ozone pollution.

Otana's research has also convinced her that the federal government must do more to reduce outdoor ozone pollution. While in Washington to receive her award from the President, she was introduced to then head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Steven Johnson.

"I think it was really intended as a photo op," says Otana, "but I took the opportunity to tell him I thought the EPA's recently revised standards for ozone pollution weren't stringent enough based on what my study had found."