AAAR 37th Annual Conference October 14 - October 18, 2019 Oregon Convention Center Portland, Oregon, USA
Abstract View
Exhaled Breath Aerosol Collection Methods
CHARLES CALL, Wayne Bryden, Dapeng Chen, Robin Wood, Zeteo Tech
Abstract Number: 588 Working Group: Bioaerosols
Abstract Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the oldest recognized diseases in human history and has resulted in the deaths of as many as one billion people over the course of time. Currently the World Health Organization estimates that 1/3 of the world’s population has a latent case of tuberculosis. From this pool of roughly two billion people, over 10 million active cases arise each year. It is the leading cause of death by infectious disease worldwide and it is known to be transmitted by exhaled breath. Virial infections are a constant threat to the global population. Coronaviruses such as that which causes Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) are also believed to be spread by exhaled breath aerosol.
Our research team is investigating mass spectrometry-based methods to assess disease status in tuberculosis patients. In the future, we anticipate screening populations in high-burden settings to identify previously unknown cases of tuberculosis and assess a patient’s infectiousness to others. The focus of our breath aerosol collection research activity is to assess the effectiveness and optimization of exhaled breath aerosol (EBA) collection methods.
Aerosol collections were completed using three healthy volunteers. Exhaled breath was sampled using a pre-determined set of deep breathing protocols. Several aerosol collection technologies were used, including a wet-walled cyclone and two types of filters. Filter samples were analyzed by mass spectrometry to semi-quantitatively compare the collection methods and respiratory protocols by quantifying signal to noise ratios for specific lipids present in the aerosol samples.
Collection of breath aerosol is challenging due to the constant variability and large range in flow rate during normal or prescribed breathing protocols, and due to the dynamic size distributions of the aerosol due to changes in humidity and temperature as the aerosol enters the ambient environment. This presentation will present results that compare the aerosol collection technologies for a given respiratory protocol and will assess the effectiveness of each breathing protocol to generate EBA. Specific challenges associated with quantitation of each EBA collection method will be reviewed.