Common Sampling Techniques Research Articles

High-efficiency pollen samplers for use in clinical allergy

I NTEREST in the particulate population of the atmosphere is common to personnel in many scientific fields, including the botanist, the plant pathologist, the cloud physicist, the medical allergist, the public health official, and the military and civilian air pollution expert. These scientists are faced with the very difficult problem of attempting to measure particulate concentrations in a turbulent atmosphere. The same problem has been encountered by the staff of the Meteorological Laboratories of the University of Michigan in the course of interdisciplinary studies carried out by a research team of botanists, allergists, public health statisticians and meteorologists. A sampler which would collect ra,gweetl pollen (20 microns in diameter) efficiently and which would be inexpensive enough to use in mass sampling programs was needed. The meteorological group has at its disposal a closed-circuit wind tunnel, which was used during the spring of 1958 to measure the efficiencies of * several of the common sampling techniques. The results were so definitive that the investigation was continued both in the tunnel and out of doors. New sampling techniques were developed and tested; two of t,hese proved to be much more efficient than the standard techniques in use.