The influence of sampling duration on recovery of culturable fungi using the Andersen N6 and RCS bioaerosol samplers

Abstract

Currently, the industry-wide trend for viable air sampling in indoor environmental investigations is to use sampling times between 2 and 4 min in duration. Our results support the routine use of a 6-min sampling time where low spore loads are expected, resulting in improved limits of detection.

Airborne culturable fungi in naturally ventilated primary school environments in a subtropical climate

“…30709), which is known as an effective instrument for bioaerosol sampling and is widely used around the world (Yao and Mainelis. 2007;Reponen et al, 2001;Saldanha and Manno, 2008). The RCS High Flow instrument has a particle diameter cut off size (d50) of 2e5 mm (Millipore, 2003) which meets the cut off size requirements for most of the fungal spores in indoor environments (2e4 mm in aerodynamic diameter) (Reponen et al, 2001).…”

“…Andersen Impactor and Biotest RCS High Flow air samplers are widely used to detect and quantify bioaerosols, identify bioaerosol release from sources, assessment of human exposure to biological agents, and monitor the effectiveness of control measures (Li, 2011;Saldanha and Manno, 2008). It should be noted that although cultivation methods are convenient, being able to identify major fungal species with simple equipment and analysis techniques, they are slow and always selective and therefore underestimate the total fungal counts (ACGIH, 1999) and may ignore some clinically relevant moulds (Baxi et al, 2013;Holme et al, 2010).…”

Spore traps need improvement to fulfil plant biosecurity requirements

“…The observation of a spore under a microscope often will not indicate if it is still alive, nor its ability to germinate and infect. Recovery of viable spores depends not only on physical characteristics of the trap, but also its ability to preserve the spores (Saldanha et al. , 2008).…”

Documentary Research of Human Respiratory Droplet Characteristics

“…Liquid impaction, operating similarly to solid impaction in terms of relying upon inertial mass, impacts into liquid agar surfaces. The studies shows that the influence of the evaporation, the limitation of the acquisition and the function of the droplet rebound relatively reduce the size and quantity of droplets collected by impaction [40][41][42][43][44][45][46].…”