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Five-year airborne pollen calendar for a Sonoran Desert city and the relationships with meteorological variability

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Abstract

Aerobiological studies are still scarce in northwestern Mexico where allergenic pollen have great impacts on health. Current global pollution and climate change problems are closely related to many allergic diseases, enhancing the need to continue researching these issues and improve life quality. This study provides the first Pollen Calendar for Hermosillo, Sonora, México. Airborne pollen were continuously collected for 5 years (2015–2019). The standardized methodology with a Hirst-type spore trap proposed for global aerobiological studies was used. Weather data were also taken from a station located in the city and used to explore correlations between climate and airborne pollen concentrations in different seasons. The most important pollen taxa recorded in air belongs to herbaceous pollen, such as Poaceae, Ambrosia, Asteraceae, Chenopodiaceae-Amaranthaceae, and some shrub trees typical of this arid region, such as Nyctaginaceae, Prosopis, Parkinsonia, and Fabaceae. The most critical herbaceous pollen related to allergies have a long mean pollen season throughout the years, and the most critical periods with high pollen concentration in air occur in two seasons, spring (March–April) and summer–fall (August–October). In these 5 years, the correlation analyses for these two peaks indicate that a link exists between pollen in the air and decreases in precipitation and temperatures, and an increase in relative humidity. An inter-annual variability in pollen concentrations was recorded related to different weather conditions. Although pollen calendars are location-specific, they are useful for future research on biological air quality scenarios in different cities. Using this standardized method for other regions can provide pollen calendars that have been proven clinically important in allergic disease management worldwide.

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Data Availability

Data sets generated during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request. Airborne pollen counts from 2016-2019 are available at the Red Mexicana de Aerobiologia http://rema.atmosfera.unam.mx/rema/Default.aspx.

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Acknowledgements

This research was financially supported by Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología-(CONACyT, in English, National Council of Science and Technology) in Mexico and to Secretaria de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (SEMARNAT, in English, Ministry for the Environment and Natural Resources) in Mexico through Grant Number 263413 to Professor Ortega-Rosas. The authors thank Carlos Enciso for illustration assistance in Fig. 1, and Diana Fischer and Michael Thomas Bogan for the English edition.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cuerpo Académico de Recursos Naturales, Licenciatura en Ecología, Unidad Académica Hermosillo, Universidad Estatal de Sonora, Ley Federal del Trabajo S.N. Col. Apolo. Hermosillo, C.P. 83100, Sonora, Mexico

    C. I. Ortega-Rosas, O. G. Gutiérrez-Ruacho & V. Amaya-García

  2. Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas del Noroeste S.C., Guaymas, Sonora, Mexico

    L. Brito-Castillo

  3. Red Mexicana de Aerobiología, Instituto de Ciencias de La Atmósfera Y Cambio Climático, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico

    M. C. Calderón-Ezquerro & C. Guerrero-Guerra

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  1. C. I. Ortega-Rosas
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  2. O. G. Gutiérrez-Ruacho
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  3. L. Brito-Castillo
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Correspondence to C. I. Ortega-Rosas.

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Ortega-Rosas, C.I., Gutiérrez-Ruacho, O.G., Brito-Castillo, L. et al. Five-year airborne pollen calendar for a Sonoran Desert city and the relationships with meteorological variability. Int J Biometeorol 67, 1853–1868 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00484-023-02546-9

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