Real-Time Characterization of the Composition of Individual Particles Emitted From Ultrafine Particle Concentrators

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Abstract
Particle concentrators are commonly used for controlling exposure levels to ambient ultrafine, fine, and coarse aerosols over a broad range of concentrations. For ultrafine aerosols, these concentrators require water condensation technology to grow and enrich these smaller sized particles (D a < 100 nm). Because the chemistry of the particles is directly related to their toxicity, any changes induced by ultrafine concentrators on ambient particles need to be better characterized in order to fully understand the results obtained in health exposure studies. Using aerosol time-of-flight mass spectrometry (ATOFMS), the size-resolved chemistry was measured of concentrated ultrafine and accumulation mode (50–300 nm) particles from several particle concentrators with different designs. This is the first report detailing the size-resolved distributions of elemental carbon (EC) and organic carbon (OC) particles sampled from concentrators. Experimental measurements of the single particle mixing state of particles in concentrated versus non-concentrated ambient air show transformations of ultrafine EC particles occur as they become coated with organic carbon (OC) species during the concentration process. Based on relative ion intensities, concentrated ultrafine particles showed a 30% increase in the amount of OC on the EC particles for the same aerodynamic size. An increase in the number fraction of aromatic- and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon-containing particles was also observed in both the ultrafine and fine size modes. The most likely explanation for such changes is gas-to-particle partitioning of organic components (e.g., water-soluble organic compounds) from the high volume of air used in the concentrator into aqueous phase ultrafine and fine aqueous particles created during the particle enrichment process.

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