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Indoor/outdoor relationships of bioaerosol concentrations in a retirement home and a school dormitory

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Abstract

The concentrations of bacterial and fungal bioaerosols were measured in a retirement home and a school dormitory from May 2012 to May 2013. In the present work, two active and passive methods were used for bioaerosol sampling. The results from the present work indicated that Bacillus spp., Micrococcus spp., and Staphylococcus spp. were the dominant bacterial genera, while the major fungal genera were Penicillium spp., Cladosporium spp., and Aspergillus spp. The results also indicated that the indoor-to-outdoor (I/O) ratios for total bacteria were 1.77 and 1.44 in the retirement home and the school dormitory, respectively; the corresponding values for total fungal spores were 1.23 and 1.08. The results suggested that in addition to outdoor sources, indoor sources also played a significant role in emitting bacterial and fungal bioaerosols in the retirement home and the school dormitory indoor.

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Acknowledgments

This work was funded by the Institute for Environmental Research (IER) of Tehran University of Medical Sciences (grant number 90-03-46-18903).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Air Pollution Research (CAPR), Institute for Environmental Research (IER), Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Sasan Faridi, Mohammad Sadegh Hassanvand, Kazem Naddafi, Masud Yunesian, Ramin Nabizadeh & Mohammad Hossein Sowlat

  2. Department of Environmental Health Engineering, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Sasan Faridi, Mohammad Sadegh Hassanvand, Kazem Naddafi, Masud Yunesian, Ramin Nabizadeh, Sadegh Niazi, Shahrokh Nazmara & Mahmood Alimohammadi

  3. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Homa Kashani

  4. Department of Environmental Health Engineering, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran

    Akbar Gholampour

  5. Immunology, Asthma and Allergy Research Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Ahad Zare

Authors
  1. Sasan Faridi
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  2. Mohammad Sadegh Hassanvand
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  3. Kazem Naddafi
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  9. Sadegh Niazi
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  12. Mahmood Alimohammadi
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Masud Yunesian.

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Responsible editor: Philippe Garrigues

Sasan Faridi and Mohammad Sadegh Hassanvand are coequal first author contributors.

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Faridi, S., Hassanvand, M.S., Naddafi, K. et al. Indoor/outdoor relationships of bioaerosol concentrations in a retirement home and a school dormitory. Environ Sci Pollut Res 22, 8190–8200 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-014-3944-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-014-3944-y

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