Effects of Low Cabin Pressures on the Normal Human Breathing of VOCs

摘要

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which include a class of chemicals with low boiling points, constitute major air-borne contaminants of concern in aircraft cabins. Existing research work has suggested that humans can be an important source of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in a relatively crowded environment such as aircraft cabin. No previous studies have been done to understand the quantitative effect of low (and cyclic) cabin pressure on the normal human breathing of VOCs, and its contribution to the overall VOC levels in aircraft cabin. The objective of this work intends to fill that knowledge gap. Two male subjects and two female subjects around the same age were selected to collect breath air samples and conduct chemical analysis. The subjects were exposed to different pressure conditions. VOCs in exhaled breath under low pressures had shown variety, and some potential bio-markers were initially selected. The concentrations of single VOCs which had 100% detection rate could have either negative or positive correlations with pressure. TVOC concentration varied with pressure with a slightly positive correlation. Due to the increase of metabolite rate under low pressure, the overall emission rate had insignificant relationship with pressure. Individual differences of exhaled VOCs existed.