COURTESY PHOTO | Longwood High School students presented their research on toxic elements in tobacco at Brookhaven National Laboratory on Monday. (From left to right) Longwood science teacher Lucinda Hemmick, sophomore Brian Zhang, Brookhaven National Laboratory research scientist Antonio Lanzirotti, sophomore Joseph DeQuarto, junior Steven Roberts, sophomore Zoha Naseer, sophomore Melanie Lasso, junior Robert O'Flaherty, junior Stuart Cohen and junior Alex Caggiano.

A group of Longwood High School students in a science research class wondered whether cigarettes made with commercially-grown tobacco are more toxic than those made with organically-grown tobacco.

Last month they carried out an experiment to test levels of toxic elements in both types of tobacco.

“They’re trying to help people stop smoking and make more intelligent choices by seeing the truth about what’s in tobacco,” said Lucinda Hemmick, the science research teacher who led the students in their experiment.

Nine sophomore and junior students received a grant to remotely use Brookhaven National Laboratory’s National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS).

By video conferencing with scientists at the laboratory using a webcam, the students collected data, discussed strategy for next steps and dictated to the scientists how to complete the experiment, as scientists directed the laser of an x-ray fluorescence microscope at different tobacco leaves.

“It was pretty cool to be able to tell the scientists what we wanted to do,” said junior Robert O’Flaherty. “We did the decision making in the experiment.”

The students thought that the radioactive element polonium, which may lead to lung cancer, would appear in both types of tobacco. Much to their surprise, they didn’t find any traces of the element. An even bigger shock was their finding higher levels of toxic elements in organic cigarette brands.

They now plan to do more research in the future using different experimentation methods or different tobacco samples to see if they find the same results.

“It’s such a surprise that we’d like to follow up on that and test tobacco using some other methods,” Dr. Hemmick said.

She said the experience, from proposing an idea and securing a grant to finding unexpected results, handed her students a real world account of scientists’ work.

“They had to go through all the frustrations a scientist would and when they found something unusual they didn’t let it phase them,” she said. “They got to experience all the joys and frustrations of an actual scientist.”

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