AAAR 34th Annual Conference
October 12 - October 16, 2015
Hyatt Regency
Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
Abstract View
Personal Air Pollution Intake: Combining Spatio-temporally Resolved Exposure and Inhalation Metrics
NICHOLAS GOOD, Taylor Carpenter, Brooke Anderson, Kirsten Koehler, Anna Molter, Ray Browning, Jennifer Peel, John Volckens, Colorado State University
Abstract Number: 448 Working Group: Aerosol Exposure
Abstract Exposure metrics which account for the amount of pollution inhaled may better elucidate the relationships between air pollution and it’s health effects. Personal exposures to black carbon (BC), carbon monoxide, particulate mass and particle number, were assessed alongside biometric measurements (heart rate and activity level) over 30-hour periods of online sampling by members of the public during their daily routine (including pre-designed commutes by car or bicycle). In a follow-up study, minute ventilation was measured during a range of activities, performed in the laboratory and in the real-world with the aim of developing a validated predictive ventilatory model based on simultaneously measured biometric parameters including heart rate and activity.
106 subjects completed exposure or ventilated assessment, resulting in 381 days of exposure data. Participant’s location was recorded via GPS and apportioned into different microenvironments (e.g. home, work, commute) using a geospatial algorithm. Exposure was then determined accounting for both duration and inhalation of the pollutants.
Validation of the predictive ventilatory models of varying complexity, based on heart rate and anthropometric variables, showed accuracy from 10% to 30% (RMSE). Our results demonstrate how personal monitoring and estimated inhalation can be used to better assess the relative contributions of different activities to air pollution intake. For example, mean BC exposure was found to be 13% [95% CI, 3%-24%] higher when commuting by bicycle compared to car, however, when ventilation rate and commute duration were accounted for, cycling exposures were estimated to be between 2 and 8 times higher. While only 2-7% (interquartile range) of the day was spent in transit, the combination of enhanced BC levels (1.39 [95% CI, 1.34, 1.44] times higher than the home) and accounting for minute ventilation meant approximately 25% of daily BC intake occurred when commutes were undertaken by bicycle.