fairfolio
Saved Projects

Indoor Air Pollution: The Pulmonary Effects of Ozone-Generating Air Purifiers

CSEF · 2007 Pharmacology/ Toxicology Fourth Award

Otana A. Jakpor · Woodcrest Christian School, Riverside, Riverside County

Overview

Objectives/Goals Although air purifiers are advertised to improve breathing, some air purifiers emit harmful ozone. Approximately 10% of California households own an air purifier that may produce ozone. The purpose of this research is to clarify the pulmonary effects of ozone-generating air purifiers, to determine whether they are helpful or harmful for breathing. Methods/Materials Experiment #1: An ozone sensor was used to measure the concentration of ozone at various distances from three ionizing room air purifiers, a personal air purifier, and an ionic pet hair brush. Experiment #2: Spirometry and pulse oximetry was performed on 24 subjects before and after a 2-hour exposure to an ionizing room air purifier. Experiment #3: Spirometry and pulse oximetry was performed on 10 subjects before and after a 3-hour exposure to a personal air purifier which hangs around the neck. Results Experiment #1: Some of the ionizing air purifiers tested produced ozone in levels higher than a Stage 3 smog alert. Experiment #2: A 2-hour exposure to an ozone-generating room air purifier reduced an important measure of pulmonary function (FEV1/FVC) among the asthmatics tested. Experiment #3: A three-hour exposure to a personal air purifier caused a statistically significant reduction in pulmonary function among both the whole study population as well as the asthmatic subset (p<0.05). Conclusions/Discussion The ionizing air purifiers I tested produced ozone and had a negative effect on an important measure of pulmonary function (FEV1/FVC).

Summary statement

This research demonstrates that certain ozone-generating air purifiers have a negative effect on an important measure of pulmonary function.

Help received

I would like to thank my mother Karen Jakpor, an asthmatic, for lending me her pulse oximeter and her microspirometer, and for teaching me how to use them. In addition, I would like to thank her for her editorial assistance. I also wish to thank Eco Sensors, Inc. for donating an ozone monitor for my research.

Awards (1)

Competition history

  • CSEF 2007 Pharmacology/ Toxicology · Entry S1515

Resources

Related projects

Closest projects by meaning, across every fair and year in the corpus.

Browse more like this

Source: California Science & Engineering Fair public projects

Save projects to your library

Sign in with Google to keep track of projects you find interesting, organized into folders. An account also raises your daily allowance for “Has this been done?”, and lets you create a key for the MCP server with a much higher limit than anonymous use. Browsing stays public.

Continue with Google