Performance of a mixing-type CNC for nanoparticles at low-pressure conditions

Performance Evaluation of an Improved Particle Size Magnifier (PSM) for Single Nanoparticle Detection

“…Various modification and applications of the PSM have been reported by several investigators (Okuyama et al 1984(Okuyama et al , 1987Seto et al 1997;Gamero-Castaño and Fernández de la Mora 2000). Other studies on alternative mixing-type CNCs (MTCNC) meant for detecting larger particle sizes have been reported by Parsons and Mavliev (2001), Mavliev (2002), Wang et al (2002), and Kim et al (2002). Table 1 shows the relevant specification for several kinds of recent PSM and Mixing-Type CNC (MTCNC).…”

Operation of the Airmodus A11 nano Condensation Nucleus Counter at various inlet pressures and various operation temperatures, and design of a new inlet system

“…Later, Okuyama et al (1984) constructed the first mixing-type CPC, a particle size magnifier (PSM), to detect nanoparticles, which was the basis for the mixing-type CPC technology. Various designs of the PSM has been built by, for example, Gamero-Castano and Fernández de la Mora (2000), Mavliev and Wang (2000), Kim et al (2002), Sgro and Fernández de la Mora (2004), Ito et al (2011) and Kim et al (2015). The previous PSMs have been mostly used to investigate various aspects of heterogeneous nucleation and droplet growth in laboratory experiments.…”

“…For example, previous research (Iida et al, 2009;Kangasluoma et al, 2013Kangasluoma et al, , 2014 has shown that relative humidity of the sample air and chemical composition of the sampled particles affect the smallest detectable size of the particle counters operated with diethylene glycol (DEG). When the CPCs are operated in the field, more uncertainties arise from varying pressure and its effect on the flow rates and activation efficiency, especially at low pressure conditions, such as on mountain tops or on board aircraft (Hermann and Wiedensohler, 2001;Kim et al, 2002;Noone and Hansson, 1990;Saros et al, 1996;Seifert et al, 2004;Takegawa and Sakurai, 2011;Liu, 1990, 1991). While these studies investigated the pressure effect in a laminar-flow-type CPC, only Kim et al (2002) have previously studied the pressure dependency of a mixing-type CPC, and their results are partly specific to their instrument.…”

“…When the CPCs are operated in the field, more uncertainties arise from varying pressure and its effect on the flow rates and activation efficiency, especially at low pressure conditions, such as on mountain tops or on board aircraft (Hermann and Wiedensohler, 2001;Kim et al, 2002;Noone and Hansson, 1990;Saros et al, 1996;Seifert et al, 2004;Takegawa and Sakurai, 2011;Liu, 1990, 1991). While these studies investigated the pressure effect in a laminar-flow-type CPC, only Kim et al (2002) have previously studied the pressure dependency of a mixing-type CPC, and their results are partly specific to their instrument. Sampling of sub-3 nm particles also requires special attention, since due to the thermal motion of particles, they can be lost to the sampling line walls.…”

“…1) and an A20 butanol CPC. The design of the A10 is based on the PSM design of Sgro and Fernández de la Mora (2004), in which the mixing chamber has only one inlet for the aerosol flow, compared to two (Gamero-Castano and Fernández de la Mora, 2000) or even four (Kim et al, 2002) in the previous designs. An in-depth description of the A10 instrument is given by Vanhanen et al (2011), although this study describes the model A09.…”