Plants emit a substantial amount of biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs) into the atmosphere. These BVOCs represent a large carbon loss and can be up to approximately 10% of that fixed by photosynthesis under stressful conditions and up to 100gCm(-2) per year in some tropical ecosystems. Among a variety of proven and unproven BVOC functions in plants and roles in atmospheric processes, r...

Methods for ranking photochemical ozone formation reactivities of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are discussed. Photochemical mechanisms for the atmospheric reactions of 118 VOCs were used to calculate their effects on ozone formation under various NOx conditions in model scenarios representing 39 different urban areas. Their effects on ozone were used to derive 18 different ozone reactivity...

Credible climate change predictions require reliable fundamental scientific knowledge of the underlying processes. Despite extensive observational data accumulated to date, atmospheric aerosols still pose key uncertainties in the understanding of Earth's radiative balance due to direct interaction with radiation and because they modify clouds' properties. Specifically, major gaps exist in the u...

In this paper, we have modeled and analyzed affinities and kinetics of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) adsorption (and desorption) on various surface chemical groups using multiple self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) functionalized film bulk acoustic resonator (FBAR) array. The high-frequency and micro-scale resonator provides improved sensitivity in the detections of VOCs at trace levels. With ...

Atmospheric pressure dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma can be used to split low molecular weight organic compounds, and the DBD-split/excited species can be swept into luminol solution to induce chemiluminescence (CL) emission. Based on this observation, a novel optical detector was proposed and preliminarily tested as a potential gas chromatographic (GC) detector in this work. The adva...

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are small molecules that exhibit high vapor pressure under ambient conditions and have low boiling points. Although VOCs contribute only a small proportion of the total metabolites produced by living organisms, they play an important role in chemical ecology specifically in the biological interactions between organisms and ecosystems. VOCs are also important in...

An early diagnosis and appropriate treatment are crucial in reducing mortality among people suffering from cancer. There is a lack of characteristic early clinical symptoms in most forms of cancer, which highlights the importance of investigating new methods for its early detection. One of the most promising methods is the analysis of volatile organic compounds (VOCs). VOCs are a diverse group ...

The aim of the study was to assess the level of air pollution by volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in a pig fattening house and in its vicinity. Air samples for chromatographic analysis were taken in the fattening house and in the vicinity of the farm. The air quality study shows that the level of organic gaseous pollutants was twice as high in the fattening house as in the atmospheric air. Alm...

This study aims at examining the reduction of indoor air contaminants by plants placed in an indoor space. Field measurements were performed using Aglaonema brevispathum, Pachira aquatica, and Ficus benjamiana, which were verified as air-purifying plants by NASA. Three conditions for the amount of plants and positions were used in two separate rooms whose dimensions are identical. The concentra...

The use of gold nanoparticles coated with an organic monolayer of thiol for application in chemiresistive sensors was initiated in the late 1990s; since then, such types of sensors have been widely pursued due to their high sensitivities and reversible responses to volatile organic compounds (VOCs). However, a major issue for chemical sensors based on thiol-capped gold nanoparticles is their po...