Fighting sniffles with Ford's allergy app and smart materials

According to WebMD, more than half of Americans test positive to one or more allergens. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that allergies have been increasing for the past three decades across age, gender and racial groups.


For this reason, Ford is increasingly concerned about drivers’ exposure to allergens -- and is making it a selling point. The automaker says its 2013 Fusion, for example, was designed to reduce pollen and skin irritants inside the vehicle, while Ford Sync applications can warn drivers of potential allergens outside.


According to Ford, its engineers tested more than 100 materials and components used in the new Fusion’s interior for allergy issues, paying particular attention to “high-touch areas” such as the seats, steering wheel, armrests, door handles and shifters. Using this information, engineers avoided or minimized potentially allergenic materials such as natural latex, hexavalent chromium and nickel.


Ford Sync also helps alert drivers to airborne health hazards on the exterior with the AppLink feature, via an Allergy Alert app available on the 2013 Fusion and other new Ford vehicles. By connecting a smartphone or tablet with the app to a vehicle with Sync AppLink and using simple voice commands, a driver can get a pollen index rating as well the allergen conditions for a given area. The app can even indicate the risk index for asthma, flu, cough, cold and ultraviolet rays.


In a further effort to combat car-borne illnesses, Ford treated its own employees -- or, more specifically, their vehicles -- as guinea pigs. To find out which parts of a vehicle interior were prime breeding grounds for micro-organisms, engineers from Ford’s Research and Innovation Center last year teamed with scientists from the University of Michigan to test the interiors of employees’ cars.


They used cotton swabs to collect samples from 10 locations -- including the steering wheel, radio buttons, door handles, window switches and gear-shift knobs – and analyzed the resulting cultures at a UM laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich. The aim of the project was to take a more active role in combating microbial growth in a car's interior.

For example, Ford found that silver ion, an EPA-approved antimicrobial additive, can significantly cut down on bacterial growth when added to interior materials. According to Ford, such experimental germ-fighting interiors could eventually find their way into future vehicles.

But if you’re suffering from allergies as springtime kicks in and you want relief now, at least in a Fusion and other Ford vehicles you may be able to avoid some of the usual symptoms, or at least know where they lurk.