Performance of UVAPS with respect to detection of airborne fungi

This paper studies the detection limit, selectivity and counting efficiency of an ultraviolet aerodynamic particle sizer spectrometer (UVAPS) with regard to aerosolized fungal spores. The study demonstrated the ability of the instrument for detection and measurement of fungal spores under controlled conditions. A reasonable correlation was found between the UVAPS and the AGI-30 impinger in measuring the aerosol fungal spore concentrations under investigation: Penicillium and Aspergillus niger (r = 0.911, p < 0.005 and r = 0.882, p < 0.05, respectively). A linear relationship between total particle concentration and fluorescent particle concentration was found in the range from 0 to 70 particles/cm(3). Its lower detection limit was found to be 0.01 particles/cm(3). The dry generation method which was used for generating fungal spores has proved to be reproducible and easy to control, as well as simple and inexpensive. Crown Copyright (C) 2007 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.