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Current Research in Air Pollutants, Air Quality and Human Health
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Current Research in Air Pollutants, Air Quality and Human Health

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Air, Climate Change and Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 November 2023) | Viewed by 5859

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Anwar Khan

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Atmospheric Chemistry Research Group, School of Chemistry, Cantock’s Close, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 1TS, UK
Interests: monitoring of indoor and outdoor atmospheric pollutants; chemical scheme development for indoor and outdoor air quality modeling; refinement of atmospheric chemistry and transport air quality modelling; kinetic study of oxidants and the evaluation of their impact on air quality using atmospheric models; impact of aircraft emissions on air quality locally and globally
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In the 21st century, air pollution is one of the most pressing concerns with terrible costs to society in the future. Air quality is inevitably linked from the emission sources of air pollutants to their adverse impacts on human health, ecosystems and the climate. Air pollutants with the strongest evidence for public health concern include particulate matter, carbon monoxide, ozone, nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide. The short-term exposure to elevated levels of air pollution can cause a range of health impacts, including reduced lung function, exacerbation of asthma and respiratory infection. The long-term exposure to air pollution can cause chronic conditions such as cardiovascular and respiratory diseases as well as lung cancer, leading to increase in morbidity and mortality. Therefore, the improvement of air quality by identifying the emission sources of both indoor and outdoor pollution, their transport mechanisms in environmental and biological systems along with analytical techniques and remediation strategies is of great scientific and practical significance. This special issue is dedicated to increasing the depth of research across all areas of the air pollution and their impacts on health and ecosystem, as well as analytical techniques for their measurement and modelling. We expect this special issue would appeal to environmental scientists, public health practitioners, and policymakers.

The scope of this special issue includes but is not limited to the following topics:

  • Identifying the sources of air pollutants;
  • Long-term air quality monitoring;
  • Air pollution prevention and control action plan;
  • Dispersion of air pollutants and air quality modeling;
  • Impact of meteorological parameters on air quality;
  • Impact of biometeorological conditions and air pollution on human health;
  • Impact of air pollution on economy and society;
  • Air pollution epidemiology and quantitative risk assessment;
  • Indoor air quality: measurement and modeling;
  • Effects of air pollution on crops.

Dr. Anwar Khan
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • air pollutants
  • health impact
  • socioeconomic impact
  • air quality monitoring
  • air quality modeling
  • risk assessment
  • indoor air quality

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

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21 pages, 2042 KiB  
Article
Culturable Bioaerosols Assessment in a Waste-Sorting Plant and UV-C Decontamination
by Candida Duarte Manuel and Kalina Samardjieva
Sustainability 2024, 16(10), 4299; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16104299 - 20 May 2024
Viewed by 647
Abstract
Waste-Sorting Plant (WSP) workers are exposed to bioaerosols containing a large variety of bacterial and fungal species, posing a critical health risk that needs to be assessed and mitigated. The present study aimed to evaluate the indoor air quality in a Portuguese WSP [...] Read more.
Waste-Sorting Plant (WSP) workers are exposed to bioaerosols containing a large variety of bacterial and fungal species, posing a critical health risk that needs to be assessed and mitigated. The present study aimed to evaluate the indoor air quality in a Portuguese WSP and the air decontamination efficiency with UV-C. The concentrations of bacteria and fungi and particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10), CO2, relative humidity, and temperature were determined at different hours in manual sorting areas (cabin and ramp) in autumn and winter in 2022 and in administrative offices and canteen in the autumn of 2023. The PM2.5 and PM10 concentrations in the air increased with the daily waste-sorting activities, especially inside the cabin, averaging 22 and 42 μg/m3, respectively, while the CO2 concentration was in the range of 343–578 ppm in both sampling sites. The bacterial species were mainly environmental (mesophilic bacteria) rather than human sources. In the waste-sorting areas, the concentration of bacteria was often found to exceed outdoor values by more than 1000 CFU/m3 on average. Additionally, the concentration of fungi indoors was consistently higher than outdoor values, in many cases exceeding 500 CFU/m3. These findings suggest that workers in these areas are frequently exposed to high levels of microbes. The indoor-to-outdoor (I/O) contamination ratios revealed that the air quality inside the administrative offices and the canteen had high pollutant concentrations during some time periods. The worst scenarios were observed in the canteen and offices with high occupancy in the afternoon. UV-C lamps at 253.7 nm and with 5.0 W irradiation power were used in the sorting cabin to test the indoor air and surface decontamination, and the results showed a high bacterial removal efficacy of over 87.6% after one hour of exposure to UV-C. The present study raises the question of whether 37 °C is the optimal incubation temperature for WSP samples since the microorganisms’ habitat before the sampling had a much lower temperature. As the waste-sorting industry expands, these findings show that the air quality of WSPs remains concerning and requires a holistic approach, integrating the working conditions of all personnel and the implementation and monitoring of mitigation measures. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Current Research in Air Pollutants, Air Quality and Human Health)
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14 pages, 632 KiB  
Article
Changes in Soil Properties with Combined Use of Probiotic Cultures and Organic Farming Practices in Degraded Soils of Bangladesh
by Md. Anwar Hossain, S. M. Shahinul Islam and Md. Mahmodol Hasan
Sustainability 2023, 15(5), 4430; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15054430 - 1 Mar 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1387
Abstract
A shift in agricultural management from chemical to organic practices is expected to reduce environmental hazards and improve soil health and productivity in Bangladesh. To increase knowledge of the impact of probiotic cultures and organic farming practices on the physical and chemical properties [...] Read more.
A shift in agricultural management from chemical to organic practices is expected to reduce environmental hazards and improve soil health and productivity in Bangladesh. To increase knowledge of the impact of probiotic cultures and organic farming practices on the physical and chemical properties of Bangladeshi soils, an investigation was carried out during the period from July 2016 to June 2019. The study included nine treatments using combinations of probiotic cultures and organic farming practices. The experiment used a randomized complete block design with three replicates. The probiotic cultures and organic practices increased soil moisture content, porosity and silt particle and decreased bulk density, particle density and sand particles. The organic matter content (11.66%), nutrient availability and electrical conductivity (8.96%) increased with the organic practices, while pH of the soil decreased. The largest significant change in the physical properties (p ≤ 0.05) was in the compost + vermicompost + green manuring treatment, while for chemical properties this was in the poultry manure + vermicompost + green manuring. These findings suggest that the above combinations of organic treatments provide most benefit to the soils of the practices considered. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Current Research in Air Pollutants, Air Quality and Human Health)
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Review

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31 pages, 3644 KiB  
Review
Trifluoroacetic Acid: Toxicity, Sources, Sinks and Future Prospects
by Maria de los Angeles Garavagno, Rayne Holland, Md Anwar Hossain Khan, Andrew J. Orr-Ewing and Dudley E. Shallcross
Sustainability 2024, 16(6), 2382; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16062382 - 13 Mar 2024
Viewed by 3236
Abstract
Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) is a known and persistent pollutant in the environment. Although several direct anthropogenic sources exist, production from the atmospheric degradation of fluorocarbons such as some hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) has been a known source for some time. The current transition from HFCs [...] Read more.
Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) is a known and persistent pollutant in the environment. Although several direct anthropogenic sources exist, production from the atmospheric degradation of fluorocarbons such as some hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) has been a known source for some time. The current transition from HFCs to HFOs (hydrofluoroolefins) is beneficial from a global warming viewpoint because HFOs are much shorter-lived and pose a much smaller threat in terms of warming, but the fraction of HFOs converted into TFA is higher than seen for the corresponding HFCs and the region in which TFA is produced is close to the source. Therefore, it is timely to review the role of TFA in the Earth’s environment. This review considers its toxicity, sources and removal processes, measurement in a variety of environments, and future prospects. New global model integrations are used to quantify the impacts of uncertainties on TFA levels using the Henry’s Law constant for TFA and the range of gas-phase kinetic parameters chosen for the reaction of OH radicals with a representative HFO (HFO-1234yf). Model runs suggest that TFA surface concentrations vary by up to 10% based on Henry’s Law data but could be up to 25% smaller than previously modelled values suggest depending on the kinetic analysis adopted. Therefore, future estimates of TFA surface concentrations based on HFO removal require updating and the kinetic analysis of TFA production warrants further investigation. The toxicity of TFA appears to be low, but further studies of a much wider range of animal and plant types are required. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Current Research in Air Pollutants, Air Quality and Human Health)
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