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Toxics
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Detection of Air Pollutants
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Detection of Air Pollutants

A special issue of Toxics (ISSN 2305-6304). This special issue belongs to the section "Air Pollution and Health".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (19 July 2024) | Viewed by 9141

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Zhiyuan Li

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Guest Editor
School of Public Health (Shenzhen), Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China
Interests: air pollution exposure assessment; indoor/outdoor air quality and human health; smart and sustainable cities
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Xinyi Niu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Human Settlements and Civil Engineering, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, China
Interests: characteristics of particulate matters; health effects of personal exposure; pulmonary effects of air pollution
Dr. Tongchuan Wei

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7908, Raleigh, NC 27695-7908, USA
Interests: transportation energy use and emissions; energy and emission modeling; emission measurement; air quality
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Globally, air pollution is a major environmental risk to human health. In 2019, 99% of the world’s population lived in places where the WHO air quality guidelines were not met. Annually, the combined effects of ambient air pollution and household air pollution are associated with 6.7 million premature deaths. The detection of air pollutants is a fundamental procedure for air quality assessments and management. Traditionally, stationary reference instruments have been widely adopted for air pollution detection. In recent years, with the rapid development of technology, smart, low-cost sensors have been increasingly applied to air pollution measurements in both indoor and outdoor environments. In addition, various novel techniques (e.g., laboratory experimental studies, remote sensing, LiDAR etc.) have been designed to reveal the processes of air pollutant reactions and formation.

Authors are invited to submit original research papers, reviews, and short communications on (but are not limited to) the following topics:

  1. Ambient air quality measurement and data analysis;
  2. The use of smart, low-cost sensors in air pollution detection;
  3. Design, evaluation, and calibration of air quality sensors and monitors;
  4. Laboratory experiments for revealing atmospheric chemistry;
  5. Remote sensing of atmospheric composition;
  6. The establishment of LiDAR systems for air quality measurement.

Dr. Zhiyuan Li
Dr. Xinyi Niu
Dr. Tongchuan Wei
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Toxics is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • air pollution
  • atmospheric chemistry
  • stationary reference instruments
  • smart low-cost sensors
  • remote sensing of air pollution
  • laboratory experimental studies
  • LiDAR system

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Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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15 pages, 4164 KiB  
Article
Impact of COVID-19 Lockdown on NO2 Pollution and the Associated Health Burden in China: A Comparison of Different Approaches
by Zhiyuan Li
Toxics 2024, 12(8), 580; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics12080580 - 10 Aug 2024
Viewed by 1051
Abstract
So far, a large number of studies have quantified the effect of COVID-19 lockdown measures on air quality in different countries worldwide. However, few studies have compared the influence of different approaches on the estimation results. The present study aimed to utilize a [...] Read more.
So far, a large number of studies have quantified the effect of COVID-19 lockdown measures on air quality in different countries worldwide. However, few studies have compared the influence of different approaches on the estimation results. The present study aimed to utilize a random forest machine learning approach as well as a difference-to-difference approach to explore the effect of lockdown policy on nitrogen dioxide (NO2) concentration during COVID-19 outbreak period in mainland China. Datasets from 2017 to 2019 were adopted to establish the random forest models, which were then applied to predict the NO2 concentrations in 2020, representing a scenario without the lockdown effect. The results showed that random forest models achieved remarkable predictive accuracy for predicting NO2 concentrations, with index of agreement values ranging between 0.34 and 0.76. Compared with the modelled NO2 concentrations, on average, the observed NO2 concentrations decreased by approximately 16 µg/m3 in the lockdown period in 2020. The difference-to-difference approach tended to underestimate the influence of COVID-19 lockdown measures. Due to the improvement of NO2 pollution, around 3722 non-accidental premature deaths were avoided in the studied population. The presented machine learning modelling framework has a great potential to be transferred to other short-term events with abrupt pollutant emission changes. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Detection of Air Pollutants)
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16 pages, 997 KiB  
Article
An In-Field Assessment of the P.ALP Device in Four Different Real Working Conditions: A Performance Evaluation in Particulate Matter Monitoring
by Giacomo Fanti, Francesca Borghi, Davide Campagnolo, Sabrina Rovelli, Alessio Carminati, Carolina Zellino, Andrea Cattaneo, Emanuele Cauda, Andrea Spinazzè and Domenico Maria Cavallo
Toxics 2024, 12(4), 233; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics12040233 - 22 Mar 2024
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1364
Abstract
This study aimed to assess the performance, in terms of precision and accuracy, of a prototype (called “P.ALP”—Ph.D. Air Quality Low-cost Project) developed for monitoring PM2.5 concentration levels. Four prototypes were co-located with reference instrumentation in four different microenvironments simulating real-world and [...] Read more.
This study aimed to assess the performance, in terms of precision and accuracy, of a prototype (called “P.ALP”—Ph.D. Air Quality Low-cost Project) developed for monitoring PM2.5 concentration levels. Four prototypes were co-located with reference instrumentation in four different microenvironments simulating real-world and working conditions, namely (i) office, (ii) home, (iii) outdoor, and (iv) occupational environments. The devices were evaluated for a total of 20 monitoring days (approximately 168 h) under a wide range of PM2.5 concentrations. The performances of the prototypes (based on the light-scattering working principle) were tested through different statistical methods. After the data acquisition and data cleaning processes, a linear regression analysis was performed to assess the precision (by comparing all possible pairs of devices) and the accuracy (by comparing the prototypes against the reference instrumentation) of the P.ALP. Moreover, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) criteria were applied to assess the possible usage of this instrumentation, and to evaluate the eventual error trends of the P.ALP in the data storage process, Bland–Altman plots were also adopted. The outcomes of this study underlined that the P.ALP performed differently depending on the microenvironment in which it was tested and, consequently, on the PM2.5 concentrations. The device can monitor PM2.5 variations with acceptable results, but the performance cannot be considered satisfactory at extremely low and remarkably high PM2.5 concentrations. Thanks to modular components and open-source software, the tested device has the potential to be customized and adapted to better fit specific study design needs, but it must be implemented with ad hoc calibration factors depending on the application before being used in field. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Detection of Air Pollutants)
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19 pages, 8215 KiB  
Article
Effects of Fireworks Burning on Air Quality during the Chinese Spring Festival—Evidence from Zhengzhou, China
by Xinzhan Liu, Ling Yang, Yan Wang, Pengfei Yan and Yimeng Lu
Toxics 2024, 12(1), 23; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics12010023 - 25 Dec 2023
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2962
Abstract
Fireworks burning significantly degrades air quality over a short duration. The prohibition of fireworks burning (POFB) policy of 2016 and the restricted-hours fireworks burning (RHFB) policy of 2023 in Zhengzhou City provide an ideal opportunity to investigate the effects of such policies and [...] Read more.
Fireworks burning significantly degrades air quality over a short duration. The prohibition of fireworks burning (POFB) policy of 2016 and the restricted-hours fireworks burning (RHFB) policy of 2023 in Zhengzhou City provide an ideal opportunity to investigate the effects of such policies and of fireworks burning on air quality during the Spring Festival period. Based on air quality ground-based monitoring data and meteorological data for Zhengzhou City, the article analyzes the impact of the POFB policy and the RHFB policy on air quality. The results show that: (1) The ban on fireworks burning significantly affects Spring Festival air quality, with a decrease of 16.0% in the Air Quality Index (AQI) value in 2016 compared to 2015 and a 74.9% increase in 2023 compared to 2022. (2) From 2016 to 2022, the Spring Festival period witnessed a substantial decrease in average concentration of main pollutants, along with a delayed occurrence of peak concentrations, indicating a noticeable “peak-shaving” effect. However, in 2023, there was an increase in pollutant concentrations, volatility, and a significant surge in hourly concentration. (3) The POFB policy and RHFB policy notably impacted PM2.5 and PM10, with a decrease of 16.1% and 23.6% in PM2.5 and PM10 concentrations, respectively, in 2016 compared to 2015, but an increase of 74.5% and 79.2%, respectively, in 2023 compared to 2022. (4) The contribution of fireworks burning to PM2.5 concentrations significantly decreased during the fireworks burning period (FBP) in 2016 after the POFB policy and increased significantly in 2023 during FBP after the implementation of the RHFB policy. Unfavorable meteorological conditions will undoubtedly exacerbate air quality pollution caused by fireworks burning. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Detection of Air Pollutants)
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Review

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26 pages, 2277 KiB  
Review
Airborne Pesticides—Deep Diving into Sampling and Analysis
by Patchimaporn Udomkun, Thirasant Boonupara, Sulak Sumitsawan, Eakalak Khan, Siwatt Pongpichan and Puangrat Kajitvichyanukul
Toxics 2023, 11(11), 883; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics11110883 - 27 Oct 2023
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2748
Abstract
The escalating utilization of pesticides has led to pronounced environmental contamination, posing a significant threat to agroecosystems. The extensive and persistent global application of these chemicals has been linked to a spectrum of acute and chronic human health concerns. This review paper focuses [...] Read more.
The escalating utilization of pesticides has led to pronounced environmental contamination, posing a significant threat to agroecosystems. The extensive and persistent global application of these chemicals has been linked to a spectrum of acute and chronic human health concerns. This review paper focuses on the concentrations of airborne pesticides in both indoor and outdoor environments. The collection of diverse pesticide compounds from the atmosphere is examined, with a particular emphasis on active and passive air sampling techniques. Furthermore, a critical evaluation is conducted on the methodologies employed for the extraction and subsequent quantification of airborne pesticides. This analysis takes into consideration the complexities involved in ensuring accurate measurements, highlighting the advancements and limitations of current practices. By synthesizing these aspects, this review aims to foster a more comprehensive and informed comprehension of the intricate dynamics related to the presence and measurement of airborne pesticides. This, in turn, is poised to significantly contribute to the refinement of environmental monitoring strategies and the augmentation of precise risk assessments. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Detection of Air Pollutants)
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