AAAR 31st Annual Conference
October 8-12, 2012
Hyatt Regency Minneapolis
Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
Abstract View
Use of Two Samplers for Determination of Quantitative and Qualitative Bioaerosols In Tijuana, Mexico, Air Basin
LILIA HURTADO, Guillermo Rodriguez, Universidad Autonoma de Baja California, Tijuana, Mexico
Abstract Number: 581 Working Group: Health Related Aerosols
Abstract Air pollution is a risk factor for health, most of the studies are related to particles and gases while some infectious diseases attributed to air pollution are by microorganisms which include bacteria, fungi, yeast and viruses. Bacteria are transported and dispersed in air as microbial consortia, bonded to plants particles, animals, pollen and soil particles called bioaerosols, which have adapted by their self or associated to others to survive. This ability can be estimated through quatitative and qualitative evaluations in time and space with procedures that allow to obtain viable microorganisms.
In this work the microbiological characterization in Tijuana, Mexico, air basin was coducted using two types of microorganisms air samplers, one of them by impact (M air T Millipore) and the other by centrifugation (Biotest Hycon). Nine sampling sites was selected along the city, including three air quality monitoring stations, samples were collected in 2011-2012 in the morning and afternoon, microbiological analysis provided information of colony forming units (CFU), genera and species. The above data is correlated with climatic factors, gases (CO, NOx, O3) and particulate matter, to establish the influence of air pollutants in microorganisms survival. Counts in the range of 1000 to 100,000 CFU were obtained per 100 liters of air, time and space variation was observed on microbial count. We detected some potentially pathogenic bacteria such as Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Streptococcus faecalis and Staphylococcus aureus, among others. There was no significant difference between the two types of samplers.