Reduction of nitrate losses from filter and impactor samplers by means of concentration enrichment

Abstract

Sampling errors (artifacts) have greatly affected the precision of the quantitative analysis of volatile species, such as particulate ammonium nitrate. This work presents the effect of the enrichment in concentration of particulate nitrate in reducing volatilization losses in impactors and Teflon filter samplers. During the performance characterization of an ambient fine particle concentrator developed by Sioutas et al. (1995a, Environmental Health Perspectives 103, 172–177, 1995b, Inhalation Toxicology, 7, 633–644, 1977, Journal of Aerosol Science 28, 1057–1071) losses of ambient ammonium nitrate from denuded and undenuded Teflon filter samplers as well as the microorifice uniform deposit impactor (MOUDI) were evaluated in Los Angeles, CA, an area where ammonium nitrate constitutes a major component of ambient fine particulate matter. The field study data were compared to those predicted theoretically for a given set of gas and particulate nitrate concentrations, temperature and relative humidity. Both theoretical and experimental results indicated that the ratio of nitrate gas-to-particle concentration affects significantly the volatilization loss, with higher volatilization losses occurring at higher gas-to-particle concentration values. The concentration enrichment of particulate-phase nitrate resulted in reducing evaporation losses from the MOUDI from 20–50% to less than 10%. Losses of nitrate from denuded Teflon filters were reduced from 60–95% to less than 30%, and for undenuded Teflon filters from 30–80% to less than 5%. Our study concluded that nitrate losses from impactor, denuded and undenuded Teflon filter samplers could be virtually eliminated by placing the sampler downstream of a particle concentrator with a small cutpoint (i.e., 0.1 μm).