Chemists find fungal shrapnel in air

In a discovery that has implications for our understanding of the air we breathe, UCI chemists report that they've found nanoscale fragments of fungal cells in the atmosphere. The pieces are extremely small, measuring about 30 nanometers in diameter, and much more abundant than previously thought, the researchers say in a study published this week in Science Advances.
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The research paper this is based on:

Atmospheric fungal nanoparticle bursts by Michael J. Lawler et al

Abstract
Aerosol nanoparticles play an important role in the climate system by affecting cloud formation and properties, as well as in human health because of their deep reach into lungs and the circulatory system.

Determining nanoparticle sources and composition is a major challenge in assessing their impacts in these areas. The sudden appearance of large numbers of atmospheric nanoparticles is commonly attributed to secondary formation from gas-phase precursors, but in many cases, the evidence for this is equivocal.

We report the detection of a mode of fungal fragments with a mobility diameter of roughly 30 nm released in episodic bursts in ambient air over an agricultural area in northern Oklahoma. These events reached concentrations orders of magnitude higher than other reports of biological particles and show similarities to unclarified events reported previously in the Amazon.

These particles potentially represent a large source of both cloud-forming ice nuclei and respirable allergens in a variety of ecosystems.
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Imo this is more evidence that mold "in the wild" and probably many microbes in the wild act differently than in the lab. Particle size matters in biology. Macrophages can't necessarily clear nanoparticles, whether natural or man-made
 
I may contact him and urge him to get in touch w omf
 

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Trish said:
Do you have a particular reason why OMF would be interested?
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They have said they want someone to look into mold/enviromental toxins and they need money but to also find the right person since thats not anyone's area of expertise at omf. Someone like this would be better in my opinion than a standard microbiologist bc the enviromental effects discussed in this paper will be more relevant to real world effects of mold than rat studies with normal sized spores in a lab. It seems like they are using innovative technology too.
 
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