Koniology (also spelled coniology) is the scientific study of atmospheric dust, together with its solid “pollution” factors such as soot, pollen, microbial spores, etc. The usual instrument for measuring dust content is a glass slide coated with a sticky material placed at one end of a funnel (a konimeter, conimeter) through which the air passes. An optical instrument for this purpose is a koniscope (coniscope). An Aitken dust counter employs an expansion chamber in which the dust-containing air sample is mixed with a larger volume of dust-free air containing water vapor. The latter gives rise to moisture droplets after sudden expansion as the dew point is passed and the particles settle on a ruled plate, to be counted under a microscope. The moisture droplets associated with dust particles in nature are known as Aitken nuclei. Other dust counters include Kern Counter and Owens Dust Recorder.
The part of the Earth's atmosphere affected by dust may be referred to as the...
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References
Aitken, J., 1923. Collected Scientific Papers.
Byers, H. R., 1959. General Meteorology. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Jacobs, W. C., 1951. Aerobiology in Compendium of Meteorology, Boston: American Meteorological Society, T. F. Malone (ed.). pp. 1103–1111.
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© 1987 Van Nostrand Reinhold
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Fairbridge, R.W. (1987). Koniology . In: Climatology. Encyclopedia of Earth Science. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-30749-4_100
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-30749-4_100
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