Abstract
This study assessed the concentration characteristics of culturable airborne microbes in 60 family homes with children aged 1–15 years in Hangzhou, southeast China. The concentration of culturable airborne microbes ranged from 314 colony-forming units (CFU)/m3 to 2903 CFU/m3, with a mean value of 873 CFU/m3. The mean fungal concentration (653 CFU/m3) was significantly higher than the mean bacterial concentration of the atmosphere (220 CFU/m3), and the proportion of airborne fungi (73.9%) was significantly higher than that of airborne bacteria (26.1%). Microbial concentrations in family homes with a male child were significantly higher than those in homes with a female child, and there was a negative correlation between microbial concentration and living area per capita in family homes. The mean microbial concentration was highest in summer, followed by spring and autumn, and lowest in winter. This study provides an exposure database of airborne microbes in family homes in southeast China, suggesting that child gender and human occupancy in family homes significantly influence the microbial concentration in the air.
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The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to the residents of the selected family homes for their cooperation. The authors also thank the teachers who provided valuable suggestions and the graduate students who performed the investigation.
Funding
This study was financially supported by the Project of Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province, China (Grant number LY17D050006), and the Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant number 81402682).
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Conceptualization was performed by Zhiguo Fang; methodology by Xiuyu Lou, Qing Tang, Junting Xie, Zhiguo Fang; formal analysis and investigation by Xiuyu Lou, Qing Tang, Junting Xie, Zhiguo Fang; writing—original draft preparation—by Xiuyu Lou, Zhiguo Fang; writing—review and editing—by Xiuyu Lou; funding acquisition—by Zhiguo Fang; resources by Zhiguo Fang; supervision by Zhiguo Fang.
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Lou, X., Yang, Q., Xie, J. et al. Concentration characteristics of culturable airborne microbes in family homes in Hangzhou, China. Aerobiologia 39, 119–131 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10453-023-09779-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10453-023-09779-6