Ruth E. Reichard is a Junior Biochemistry (BS) and Spanish Major
Past Projects
A Rapid and Sensitive Colorimetric Method for the Detection of Several Toxic Heavy Metals (2021)
Frederick B. Kilmer Research Award
Gold nano-particles are versatile nano-materials that have been widely used in many applications, including cancer diagnosis, drug delivery and biosensing. Here, we developed a rapid and sensitive colorimetric method for the detection of several toxic heavy metals. Our simple room temperature synthesis of gold nano-particles utilizes ascorbic acid as a reducing and capping agent to produce catalytically active gold nano-particles in a matter of a few minutes. Our results show a high selectivity for 4 toxic metals (i.e. aluminum, lead, mercury, and chromium) over sixteen potential interfering metal cations. A detection limit of 50 ppb based on a visual color change was achieved, but much lower values (single ppb or less) can be detected with the use of a conventional UV-vis spectrophotometer.
- Student(s): Ruth E. Reichard
- Project Mentor(s): Fadi Bou-Abdallah
- L&RF 2021 Presentaion-Ruth Reichard
- L&RF 2021 Video Presentation
