Entrepreneur of the Year: Dr. Michael Evans is the Midwest "turnaround" winner and national contender in Ernst & Young's annual awards program.

AuthorHromadka, Erik
PositionCover story - Company overview

IT'S A BIG DEAL WHEN the day's mail arrives at AIT Laboratories. That's because the company's headquarters near the Indianapolis International Airport typically gets some 1,400 specimens of blood, urine and tissues that each require careful testing and analysis.

As one of the leading forensics laboratories in the nation and also specializing in pain management, clinical and pharmaceutical testing, AIT provides state-of-the-art analysis for law enforcement, attorneys, medical examiners, hospitals and a variety of corporate clients.

Founded in 1990 by president and CEO Michael A. Evans, the company has grown rapidly in recent years after almost going out of business in the late 1990s and this summer Evans was named Midwest winner and national contender in the 2008 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award in the "turnaround" category

TESTING AROUND THE CLOCK.

When the first of hundreds of samples marked BioHazard arrive in overnight shipping packages, AIT begins an around-the-clock process of testing that utilizes dozens of chemists and toxicologists and high-tech equipment. Each specimen gets a bar code and is logged into the company's computer system, ensuring a chain of custody that allows the results to be used in everything from routine drug tests to murder trials.

Samples of the specimens are then organized in batches of test tubes that are processed in mass spectrometers, which can identify the presence of more than 300 drugs. Samples testing positive for drugs are retested for confirmation and results are usually available in 24 to 48 hours. Forensic test results often takes 10 days or longer.

AIT has invested in innovative procedures such as using "time-of-flight" mass spectrometry, which measures the amount of time a particle moves across a known distance and can provide very accurate identification of substances.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The company has been able to use that technology in some interesting investigations. For example, Forensics Manager Kevin Shanks helped to unlock a mysterious death of a 25-year-old farm worker in Illinois who was found dead after texting "help" to his wife. One of the few clues was a puncture wound in the man's wrist and a syringe with a thick, bent needle near the body

Blood and urine from the autopsy were sent to AIT, but initial results didn't find any of the hundreds of drugs that AIT normally identifies. However, Shanks expanded his research and discovered a veterinary medicine used to treat...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT