Characteristics of indoor, outdoor, and personal exposures to carbonyl compounds

Human exposure to carbonyl compounds may lead to adverse health effects including irritation and cancer. Indoor, outdoor, and personal air concentrations of a large suite of carbonyl compounds were determined as part of the Relationships of Indoor, Outdoor, and Personal Air (RIOPA) study. The overall goal of this dissertation research is to understand the source emissions/formation of residential indoor and outdoor carbonyl compounds and the impact of the pollution sources and personal time/activities on human exposure of carbonyl compounds.; The estimated photochemical production for the measured carbonyl compounds was up to 60%. Photochemical activity, however, resulted in a net loss for formaldehyde on warmer sampling days. The concentrations of most measured carbonyl compounds significantly decreased with increasing distance between a measured residence and one or more major highways or freeways. Results also show that outdoor concentrations generally decreased with an improved atmospheric dispersion condition and with an increased atmospheric precipitation.; A one-compartment mass balance model was constructed to calculate the indoor source strength and fractional outdoor contributions to indoor carbonyl concentrations. Formaldehyde and acetaldehyde had the strongest indoor source strengths with the estimated median values of 3.9 mg/hr and 2.6 mg/hr, respectively. All the other compounds had indoor source strengths less than 1 mg/hr. Consistent with the indoor source strength results, the estimated outdoor contributions to indoor concentrations were low for formaldehyde. The outdoor contributions to indoor concentrations for the other compounds ranged from 10% to 90% across measured homes, indicating that both indoor and outdoor sources had contributions on indoor concentrations of these compounds.; Residential indoor concentration, in general, well predicted the central tendency of personal exposure concentrations for most of the measured carbonyls. However, the predictability on cross-individual variability for most measured compounds was substantially poor. A factor analysis, coupled with multiple linear regression analyses, was performed to examine the impact of human activities on personal exposure concentrations. A set of personal activities were identified that had an impact on measured personal exposure concentrations. These activities include motor vehicle related activities, home gardening activities, perfume use, and nail polish hardener/remover use.