Team:UChile Biotec/Fieldwork
1.
First Prototype
Prior our trip we designed a prototype of a device, taking into consideration main needs of affected people based in our knowledges about the problem. To achieve this, we used the following process to design a product. To find more information about steps in the design click here.
We knew that people who harvest shellfish canʼt know immediately if the products they extract are contaminated with HAB (harmful algal blooms) related toxins, so they have to extract everything, then test it and wait for the results to be able to sell the extracted products. Many times they lose everything because itʼs contaminated and as a consequence they waste a whole day of work and money that implicates less food in their houses. It is for that reason that fishermen carry in their boats a cat to which they give seafood and looks if it paralyzes, if it does, then it is contaminated so they have to move to another zone to extract shellfish.
We realized that we had to replace the “cat method” for a better and more reliable method to test shellfish in situ. So we create the BiMaTox (biosensing for marine toxins) Kit, considering a grinder to treat the sample, a piece of paper in which is going to be our lyophilized molecular construct, a drop for add buffer, easy to understand instructions and a box to protect all.
Considering all previous we got our first prototype, which was carved in wood to be tested.
Next we had to materialize testing this prototype and learn more about the people's life in the affected region, which we achieved by traveling to south of Chile.
3.
Trip
Seremi de Salud
It is an institution responsible for protecting people's health. SEREMI controls shellfish that will be consumed in Chile through “Red Tide Program”. They determine the so called "closed areas" where red tide (HAB) is lethal, and "open areas" where people are allowed to harvest shellfish because there isn't a lethal concentration of toxins related to the red tide. They also must take samples daily in Angelmó, Calbuco, Carelmapu and Maullín to authorize the extraction on these zones.
Additionally every product extracted must be authorized by SEREMI DE SALUD to be sold. To achieve this, the institution takes samples from harvested products and analyze them in their laboratories to evaluate the red tide concentration. If shellfish has toxic amounts of toxins related to HAB are found, the whole lot is discarded and thrown away. The commercialization of non-certified shellfish is penalized with a fine. This institution has a lot of duties more than just checking the red tide. They continually organize forums to educate the population, apart from other duties related to the health area.
Sernapesca
It is an institution dependent on the ministry of economy, they are responsible for supervising products extracted from the sea that are exported. SERNAPESCA controls toxins related to red tide in shellfish that will be exported through the “Bivalve shellfish health program”.
Like the products that are consumed in Chile, shellfish that will be exported must be sampled to be sold, through laboratories that they authorize. In contrast to SEREMI DE SALUD, SERNAPESCA doesn't performs the samplings neither financing it, they only check it is done.
Sampling must be analyzed through bioassay, because is the worldwide accepted method, especially in Europe where there are our principal shellfish customers, this method requires 3 mice for each sample.
Chiloé Archipielago
This Archipelago is the most magic place in our country, it has lots of myths and legends and they say that it is full of wizards and witches. This place is also known for its characteristic churches, wool products, and special vegetables that grow specifically in this archipelago. Chiloé is an important place for our team because the most recent crisis, in 2016, related with red tide affected almost the whole archipelago, and the principal economic activity of this place is the extraction of seafood, so red tide not only affects the economy of this place, but also the entire society.
Castro
Castro is the biggest city in Chiloé Archipelago, this city is beautiful and you can find the biggest and most colorful church in the archipelago, also you can find a characteristic kind of house called “palafito”, that consists in houses built above large wooden poles above the sea. This city has the principal government offices related to the archipelago and there is the principal laboratory in charge of the red tide detection LABTOX.
Labtox
LABTOX is a laboratory that is part of Medicine Faculty from Universidad de Chile. It is the only laboratory authorized by the ministry to certificate shellfish products in Chiloé. Each sampling must be analyzed using 3 mice in the bioassay for paralytic toxins, for lipophilic toxins they use HPLC-MS/MS and for amnesic toxines they use HPLC-UV to analyze the samples.
This laboratory has been one of our major supports throughout our project evolution, and visit this place was very helpful to understand better processes that take place there. People that are part of LABTOX each day they put a lot of effort to change official method to detect paralytic toxins with mice, so they have shown great interest in Tenzyme Vilu Project, encouraging us to go ahead with this project.
The process is very simple. First they cultivate mussels putting seeds along a rope, then they wait few months until mussels are able to be harverst. If water and eventually this animals are contaminated with HAB related toxins, they wait a while for decontamination and then harvest. So in this case BiMaTox could be useful to determine when they can extract products, without necessarily having to take samples to the laboratory.
Then we met with TRANSANTARCTIC´s fishermen to test our prototype. First we ask everyone to grind the shellfish samples with our device, the effluent was collected in the glass, second we ask to put pH paper inside the sample collected in the glass, and finally we ask to identify the color in a pH scale, similar to our biosensor that was not liofilizated yet.
To evaluate the impact of the device, we asked them to answer a questionnaire at the end of the procedure and we answered some questions too based ir our observations. Here are the results:
To find more information about results click here.