Scientists working to make biological, chemical sensor the size

GOLDEN, Colo. -- Scientists are working on sensors that could sound the alarm if chemical or biological agents show up in mail sorting machines, air vents or offices at risk for attack.

The challenge for researchers at the Colorado School of Mines and Tennessee's Oak Ridge National Laboratory is reducing a bulky military sensor towed on a small trailer to the size of a shoebox.

With five dead and 13 sickened by anthrax, the government is trying to identify and produce a reliable, portable detection system for civilian use, said Duane Lindner, deputy director of the chem-bio security program at New Mexico's Sandia National Laboratories.

Chemistry professors Kent Voorhees and Franco Basile at the School of Mines, and Wayne Griest at Oak Ridge would shrink the 170-pound, garbage compactor-size Block II Chemical and Biological Mass Spectrometer.

The sensor and equally large air collection system, which resembles a waist-high metallic mushroom, are part of a mini laboratory towed into battle by a Humvee. It can detect a wide range of chemical agents such as sarin within 30 seconds and biological agents such as anthrax in less than four minutes.

The sensor, manufactured by Hamilton Sundstrand Sensor Systems in Pomona, Calif., shoots a laser through a substance and measures the spectrum on the other end. Each compound bends light in a specific way.

New technology being tested at the laboratories would convert the sensor into an electronic nose. Instead of light, a collection of different surfaces would measure how different molecules react to electricity.