Indoor Air Quality Laboratories
IAQ test chamber
The indoor air quality chamber allows study of the impact of air distribution on indoor environmental conditions, including air temperature, humidity, velocity, and contaminant concentration. The facility consists of two well-insulated chambers to simulate an indoor space adjacent to an ambient condition. The indoor room is reconfigurable to allow air supply from ceiling, wall, or under-floor diffusers. It is also reconfigurable to allow consideration of different types of indoor environments, such as offices, classrooms, industrial workspaces, air craft passenger areas, etc. The indoor chamber is equipped with a particle image velocimetry (PIV) system to enable visualization of the flow field. Measurement arrays of thermocouples, hot-wire anemometers, humidity sensors, and gas sampling tubes connected to a gas chromatograph allow detailed 3-dimensional characterizations.
IAQ Chamber - researchers setting up PIV measurement system
The facilities allow for controlled experimental studies on the fate and transport of particulate and gaseous indoor air pollutants that will aid in developing improved mechanistic models of pollutant emissions and human exposure. These facilities will supplement field measurements and personal exposure monitoring studies to better understand the mechanisms by which people are exposed to aerosols and gases and will guide implementation of control strategies (filtration, ventilation) to reduce exposure. The chamber facilities can be modified to simulate different indoor environments, such as offices, classrooms, aircraft cabins, hospitals and healthcare facilities, diverse occupational workplaces, and residential environments. CHPB employs state-of-the-art aerosol and air quality instrumentation for measurement of particles from as small as a single nanometer in size to large pollen particles tens of micrometers in diameter, as well as portable and low-cost sensors for creating distributed indoor and outdoor air quality networks.