Diurnal Mutagenicity of Airborne Particulate Organic Matter Adjacent to a Heavily Traveled West Los Angeles Freeway

Abstract

The bacterial mutagenicity of ambient particulate organic matter (POM) was measured for consecutive 3-hour time intervals over a 27-hour period in March 1983 at two sites on opposite sides of the heavily traveled San Diego Freeway (I-405) in West Los Angeles (WLA), California, the diurnal variations in the direct (not requiring S9 metabolic activation) mutagenic burden of airborne particulates and the magnitude of the mutagen doses observed at these sites were similar to those previously observed at a site just east of downtown Los Angeles (ELA). Highs (∼150 rev m−3) and lows (∼35 rev m−3) in mutagen densities occurred over short time intervals (a few hours) probably due to changes in emissions, mixing heights and wind speeds. Offshore air flows which drained the air basin between midnight and 0600 PST resulted in elevated mutagen density levels at the western edge of the Los Angeles Basjn. The incremental burden of direct mutagens in respirable POM attributable to freeway traffic reached 50 rev m−3 during this study. Consistent with our results for ELA there was diminished response on the Salmonella typhimurium nitroreductase-deficient strain TA98NR vs. TA98 suggesting that nitroarenes contribute significantly to the direct mutagenicity of POM collected at the WLA sites.