Development of a method for bacteria and virus recovery from heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) filters

Farnsworth J.E., Goyal S.M., Kim S.W., Kuehn T.H., Raynor P.C., Ramakrishnan M.A., Anantharaman S., Tang W.
Year:
2006
Bibliographic info:
The Journal of Environmental Monitoring, 2006, Vol. 8, pp 1006-1013

The aim of that paper is to study the effectiveness of building air handling units (AHUs) in serving high volume sampling devices for airborne bacteria and viruses. According to Ashrae standard 52.2.-1999, an HVAC test facility was built and used for the controlled loading of HVAC filter media with aerosolized bacteria and virus. A choice of non pathogenic bacteria and animal viruses were nebulized in separate tests and injected into the test duct facility upstream of a MERV 14 filter. The results of the experiments are presented; they indicate that the airborne concentration of sporeforming bacteria in buildling AHUs can be determined with the analysis of the material collected on HVAC filter media, but the culture-based analytical technique is not possible for virus recovery.

< Back to publications