Aerosol Filtration by Sorbent Beds

Fixed beds of sorbent media are used for the evaluation of poiynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) present in air. Twostage sampling and separate extraction and analyses of PAH associated with aerosol particles and those present in the vapor state are usually performed. The ability of commonly used sorbents to retain particulate matter introduces a potential for reducing the time and cost of PAH evaluation procedures.

The filtration efficiency of three sorbent media, Florisil, XAD-2, and polyurethanefoam (PUF), for particles in 0.1 to 1 µm size range was studied using airflow rates from 4 to 2501 /mm through a PS 1 sorbent cartridge. Theoretical considerations were used to identify the principal filtration mechanisms and to assess the predictability of the aerosol filtration performance of sorbent filters. The results of this study indicate XAD-2 to be an efficient filtration medium owing to the electrostatic enhancement of capturing and retaining aerosol particles.

As a result of theoretical considerations, Brownian diffusion and inertial deposition were found to be major filtration mechanisms accompanied by electrostatic effects. While the efficiency of the diffusional deposition mechanism was reasonably well predicted with available theories, modeling of submicron particle impaction at higher fluid velocities appeared to be inadequate. Further developments are suggested to improve our understanding of filtration phenomena in sorbent beds under high flow rate conditions.     

The Emissions and Dispersion Modeling System (EDMS): Its Development and Application at Airports and Airbases

A new complex source microcomputer model has been developed for use at civil airports and Air Force bases. This paper describes both the key features of this model and its application in evaluating the air quality impact of new construction projects at three airports: one in the United States and two in Canada.

The single EDMS model replaces the numerous models previously required to assess the air quality impact of pollution sources at airports. EDMS also employs a commercial data base to reduce the time and manpower required to accurately assess and document the air quality impact of airfield operations.

On July 20, 1993, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued the final rule (Federal Register, 7/20/93, page 38816) to add new models to the Guideline on Air Quality Models. At that time EDMS was incorporated into the Guideline as an Appendix A model.     

Addressing climate change: Determinants of consumers' willingness to act and to support policy measures

Consumers influence climate change through their consumption patterns and their support or dismissal of climate mitigation policy measures. Both climate-friendly actions and policy support comprise a broad range of options, which vary in manifold ways and, therefore, might be influenced by different factors. The aims of the study were, therefore, two-fold: first, we intended to find a meaningful way to classify different ways of addressing climate change. Second, we aimed to examine which determinants influence people's willingness to engage in these behaviors. We conducted a large-scale mail survey in Switzerland in which respondents rated, among other items, their willingness to act or support a range of possible actions and mitigations measures. A principal component analysis indicated that a distinction in terms of a behavior's directness as well as a differentiation according to perceived costs seem to be appropriate to classify climate-friendly actions. Multiple regression analyses showed that perceived costs and perceived climate benefit turned out to be the strongest predictors for willingness to act or to support climate policy measures. The strong influence of perceived climate benefit might reflect a strategy of reducing cognitive dissonance. As high-cost behaviors are more difficult to adopt, consumers may reduce dissonance by dismissing high-cost behaviors as not effective in terms of climate mitigation. Political affiliation proved to be another strong determinant of willingness to act or support. Participants on the right wing were less willing to show indirect climate-friendly behaviors, change their mobility behaviors, and to support any type of climate mitigation policy measures. Climate-friendly low-cost behaviors, however, were not influenced by political affiliation.     

Sustainability and emerging issues in scholarly (self-)publishing

In American academic circles, peer-reviewed hard-copy book publishing remains a crucial part of the tenure and promotion process as well as a method of bestowing prestige upon authors accepted by university presses and other mainstream venues. Although a few respected individuals self-published as early as the seventeenth century, the emergence of desktop publishing during the 1980s led to hard-copy and virtual (self-)publishing venues of several kinds, including PDF formatting and the establishment of POD (print on demand) firms. Online, PDF, POD printing, and other challenges to traditional academic publishing can save money and improve efficiency as well as help sustain our forests and other natural resources.     

Relationships Between Nitrogen Transformation Rates and Gene Abundance in a Riparian Buffer Soil

Denitrification is a critical biogeochemical process that results in the conversion of nitrate to volatile products, and thus is a major route of nitrogen loss from terrestrial environments. Riparian buffers are an important management tool that is widely utilized to protect water from non-point source pollution. However, riparian buffers vary in their nitrate removal effectiveness, and thus there is a need for mechanistic studies to explore nitrate dynamics in buffer soils. The objectives of this study were to examine the influence of specific types of soluble organic matter on nitrate loss and nitrous oxide production rates, and to elucidate the relationships between these rates and the abundances of functional genes in a riparian buffer soil. Continuous-flow soil column experiments were performed to investigate the effect of three types of soluble organic matter (citric acid, alginic acid, and Suwannee River dissolved organic carbon) on rates of nitrate loss and nitrous oxide production. We found that nitrate loss rates increased as citric acid concentrations increased; however, rates of nitrate loss were weakly affected or not affected by the addition of the other types of organic matter. In all experiments, rates of nitrous oxide production mirrored nitrate loss rates. In addition, quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) was utilized to quantify the number of genes known to encode enzymes that catalyze nitrite reduction (i.e., nirS and nirK) in soil that was collected at the conclusion of column experiments. Nitrate loss and nitrous oxide production rates trended with copy numbers of both nir and 16s rDNA genes. The results suggest that low-molecular mass organic species are more effective at promoting nitrogen transformations than large biopolymers or humic substances, and also help to link genetic potential to chemical reactivity.     

Exposure Times to the Spring Atrazine Flush Along a Stream-Reservoir System1

Stoeckel, James A., Jade Morris, Elizabeth Ames, David C. Glover, Michael J. Vanni, William Renwick, and María J. González, 2012. Exposure Times to the Spring Atrazine Flush Along a Stream-Reservoir System. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 48(3): 616-634. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752-1688.2011.00633.x Abstract: We used enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay to examine reservoir-mediated shifts in spring to fall exposure of aquatic organisms to the spring atrazine pulse over four years in a Midwestern stream-reservoir system. Peak atrazine concentrations in the major inflowing stream exceeded 10 μg/l in all four years. The reservoir had a beneficial effect in two of four years by diluting atrazine below the 10 μg/l threshold. However, during the other two years, exposure times above 10 μg/l were approximately doubled in the reservoir compared to the major inflowing stream. Thresholds of 3 and 5 μg/l were exceeded during all four years in the reservoir. The uplake and downlake reservoir sites were four to five times more likely to exceed these thresholds and aquatic organisms were subjected to longer exposure times above these thresholds compared to the inflowing stream. Release of elevated atrazine concentrations from the reservoir extended exposure times in the outflowing stream. This effect was most pronounced just below the dam. Aquatic organisms upstream of the reservoir were most likely to experience acute exposures whereas organisms within and immediately downstream of the reservoir were more likely to experience chronic exposures. The ubiquity of reservoirs and the annual spring herbicide flush highlight the importance of considering the presence and relative location of reservoirs when assessing risk to aquatic communities as well as locations of drinking water intakes.     

Isolation of mesotrione-degrading bacteria from aquatic environments in Brazil

Mesotrione is a benzoylcyclohexane-1,3-dione herbicide that inhibits 4-hydroxyphenyl pyruvate dioxygenase in target plants. Although it has been used since 2000, only a limited number of degrading microorganisms have been reported. Mesotrione-degrading bacteria were selected among strains isolated from Brazilian aquatic environments, located near corn fields treated with this herbicide. Pantoea ananatis was found to rapidly and completely degrade mesotrione. Mesotrione did not serve as a sole C, N, or S source for growth of P. ananatis, and mesotrione catabolism required glucose supplementation to minimal media. LC-MS/MS analyses indicated that mesotrione degradation produced intermediates other than 2-amino-4-methylsulfonyl benzoic acid or 4-methylsulfonyl-2-nitrobenzoic acid, two metabolites previously identified in a mesotrione-degrading Bacillus strain. Since P. ananatis rapidly degraded mesotrione, this strain might be useful for bioremediation purposes.     

Desorption of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons from field-contaminated soil to a two-dimensional hydrophobic surface before and after bioremediation

This study investigated environmental distributions and production mechanisms of chlorinated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (Cl-PAHs) in the sediments from some tidal flats located in Asia. Cl-PAHs were found in sediments taken from Arao tidal flat, Kikuchigawa River and Shirakawa River. The range of ∑Cl-PAHs was from 25.5 to 483 pg g⁻¹ for Kikuchigawa River and Arao tidal flat, respectively.Concentrations of PAHs and Cl-PAHs showed no significant correlations (r = 0.134). This result suggests that the origins of these compounds differ. In the identified Cl-PAH isomers, the most abundant Cl-PAH isomer was 9,10-dichloroanthracene (9,10-di-Cl-ANT) in the three sites. In general, concentrations of Cl-ANTs in the coastal environment are about 3-5 orders of magnitude lower than those of anthracene (ANT). However, concentration ratios between Cl-ANTs and ANT (Cl-ANTs/ANT) in the sediments ranged from 4.1% to 24.6%. This result indicated that Cl-PAHs were not generated under industrial processes but the high concentration ratios have resulted from the contribution of photochemical production of Cl-ANTs in the sediments because ANT is known to have high photochemical reactivity.For examining this phenomenon, ANT adsorbed onto glass beads was irradiated with UV under the mimicked field conditions of tidal flats. As a result, it was noticed that, while chlorinated derivatives were negligible in a light-controlled group, production of 2-Cl-ANT, 9-Cl-ANT and 9,10-diCl-ANT on the irradiated surface were found in this study. These results suggest that photochemical reaction of PAHs can be a potential source of the occurrence of Cl-PAHs in the coastal environment.     

Block Copolymers Containing (R)-3-Hydroxybutyrate and Isosorbide Succinate or (S)-Lactic Acid Mers

A new aliphatic block copolyester was synthesized in bulk from transesterification techniques between poly((R)-3-hydroxybutyrate) (PHB) and poly(isosorbide succinate) (PIS). Additionally, other two block copolyesters were synthesized in bulk either from transesterification reactions involving PHB and poly(l-lactide) (PLLA) or from ring-opening copolymerization of l-lactide and hydroxyl-terminated PHB, as result of a previous transesterification reactions with isosorbide. Two-component blends of PHB and PIS or PLLA were also prepared as comparative systems. SEC, MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOFMS), ¹H and ¹³C NMR spectroscopy, WAXD, solubility tests, and TG thermal analysis were used for characterization. The block copolymer structures of the products were evidenced by MALDI-TOFMS, ¹³C NMR, and WAXD data. The block copolymers and the corresponding binary blends presented different solubility properties, as revealed by solubility tests. Although the incorporation of PIS sequences into PHB main backbone did not enhance the thermal stability of the product, it reduced its crystallinity, which could be advantageous for faster biodegradation rate. These products, composed of PHB and PIS or PLLA sequences, are an interesting alternative in biomedical applications.     

Comparison of selected nutrients and bacteria from common contiguous soils inside and outside swine lagoon effluent spray fields after long-term use

Swine (Sus scofa domestica) lagoon effluent is a valuable resource. In the U.S. Mid-South it is applied from April to September to fertilize grass hay in spray-irrigated fields. Lagoon levels of nutrients and bacteria, and soil levels of nutrients have been documented, but little was known of effluent bacterial levels in soil. The present study examined levels of selected effluent bacteria and nutrients in soils inside and outside spray fields after >15 yr of effluent irrigation. Samples were collected February to March 2009 from contiguous soils spanning adjacent irrigated and nonirrigated areas. Separate soil cores for bacterial and nutrient tests were collected in pairs <10 cm apart. Five cores each were collected at 15-m intervals and combined, respectively, to comprise inside and outside samples from each of 20 soils (four each from five farms/spray fields). Analyses of data combined across all soils showed higher pH and Mehlich-3-extracrable (M3-) P, Mg, K, Na, Cu, and Zn inside than outside spray fields, while total N, total C, M3-Ca, and M3-Mn did not differ. Bacterial levels were higher inside than outside spray fields for heterotrophic plate counts, thermotolerant coliforms, Staphylococcus spp., and Clostridium perfringens, but levels of Escherichia coli and Enterococcus spp. were not different. Cultural presence/absence tests for three pathogens (Listeria spp., Campylobacter spp., and Salmonella spp.) detected only Listeria spp., which did not differ inside (23% positive samples) and outside (28% positive). Molecular tests detected all three pathogens at low levels that were not different inside and outside. We found no evidence of cumulative buildup of Campylobacter spp., Listeria spp., or Salmonela s. in spray field soils.