1 Department of Preventive Medicine, School of Public Health, Health Sciences University of Mongolia.
2 Environmental Central Laboratory, National Agency for Meteorology and Environmental Monitoring.
3 World Health Organization, Mongolia Country Office, Ulaanbaatar.
Өгүүллийн PDF-ийг татах
Airborne particulate trace metals have important health implications. As a consequence, their concentrations are increasingly monitored in many urban locations worldwide. In Mongolia, air particle monitoring was started 2 years ago, but research on the health effects of air pollution in Mongolia has been very limited. Also, the effects of exposure to specific components of ambient fine particulate matter (PM2.5, including metals, have not been fully characterized in Mongolia. The objective of this study was to determine PM mass concentrations and elemental composition in PM10 and PM2.5 (airborne particulate matter smaller than 10 μm and 2.5 μm, respectively) during winter time. PM10/2.5 samples were collected by a Harvard Impactor at the urban site of Ulaanbaatar, the capital city of Mongolia, and analyzed for 36 elements by Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). Ambient air samples were collected from 22 January to 23 March, 2010. While Ag was the least abundant trace metal with a mean concentration of 0.95 ng m−3, Fe showed the maximum mean concentration of 5701.53ng/m3. The daily concentration variations of 36 elements in ambient air were in the range from 0.03ng/m3 to 884ng/m3. PM air concentrations exceed WHO Air Quality Guidelines.
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