Aerosols

$12 Million NSF Grant Will Establish Nationwide Atmospheric Measurement Network

A photo of large mountains with a few trees and small white spots of snow in Yellowstone National Park.

Georgia Institute of Technology Professor Nga Lee “Sally” Ng has earned a $12 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Mid-Scale Research Infrastructure program to provide high time-resolution (every 1 to 15 minutes), long-term measurements of the properties of atmospheric particulates known as aerosols, which have significant effects on health and climate change.

Friday, October 8, 2021

The next frontier in environmental engineering: Brown tackles public health issues through the microscope

"The next frontier in environmental engineering: Brown tackles public health issues." Joe Brown and a student test environmental samples in his lab. (Photo: Gary Meek, Design: Sarah Collins)

Joe Brown’s research is largely focused on water contamination and its impact on public health. He travels to communities around the world measuring microbes in each environment to gather exposure data and determines what it means for the health and safety of residents. In a recent trip to India, Brown found aerosolized Giardia and Salmonella, pathogens not normally known to be transmitted via air. This discovery creates a new challenge in environmental engineering, one where microbes associated with water and sanitation are transmitted via the air (aerosols), potentially leading to new pathways of disease transmission.

Monday, December 11, 2017

Danger in the air? Brown wins NSF CAREER grant to find out

Assistant Professor Joe Brown has won an Early Career Development Award from the National Science Foundation. These so-called CAREER grants recognize promising young faculty with funds to help them establish the research director of their careers. (Photo: Jess Hunt-Ralston)

When Joe Brown went to India last summer, he was hoping to collect samples that could help answer some questions he’d been thinking about for a while. His years studying sanitation and global health had given him the idea that the open sewers and overflowing latrines common in the dense cities of the developing world could be linked with disease through an unusual mechanism: airborne transmission of pathogens.

Friday, February 24, 2017

Less sulfate in the air, but it’s still as acidic as ever

Hongyu Guo, Rodney Weber and Ted Russell on their research platform atop the Ford Environmental Science & Technology Building.

Acidic sulfur emissions from power plants have been rapidly declining over the past decade, and the neutralizing base – ammonia – is emitted from a different source, and has not declined. This has led many atmospheric scientists to assume that the ambient sulfate particles we all breathe are becoming less acidic and therefore less toxic. But a new study shows this intuitive expectation hasn’t happened, at least not in the Southeast United States, where the remaining sulfate particles appear to be as acidic as ever.

Monday, February 22, 2016
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School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
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Phone: 404-894-2201
Fax: 404-894-2278