Chemical, Microbiological, Health and Comfort Aspects of Indoor Air Quality - State of the Art in SBS

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-x

   PDF

2. Introduction

   1. The Sick Building Syndrome — Overview and Frontiers

      • Thomas Lindvall

      Pages 1-14

3. Chemical and Biological Aspects

   1. The Dynamics of the Indoor Environment and Some Strategical Aspects of Indoor Measurements

      • Peder Wolkoff

      Pages 15-24

   2. Organic Indoor Pollutants: Sources, Species, and Concentrations

      • B. Seifert

      Pages 25-36

   3. Sampling and Analysis of Organic Indoor Air Pollutants

      • H. Knöppel

      Pages 37-48

   4. Characterization of Organic Emissions from Indoor Sources

      • M. De Bortoli, A. Colombo

      Pages 49-58

   5. Sensory Characterization of Air Quality and Pollution Sources

      • P. O. Fanger

      Pages 59-71

   6. Indoor Microbiological Pollutants — Sources, Species, Characterisation and Evaluation

      • Brian Flannigan

      Pages 73-98

4. Effects of Indoor Air Pollution on Humans

   1. Irritation of the upper airways. Mechanisms and structure-activity relationships

      • Gunnar Damgård Nielsen, Lea Frimann Hansen, Yves Alarie

      Pages 99-114

   2. Assessment Methods and Causes of Eye Irritation in Humans in Indoor Environment

      • S. Kjærgaard

      Pages 115-127

   3. Indoor Environment and the Skin

      • Berndt Stenberg

      Pages 129-140

   4. Sensory Effects for Indoor Air Quality Control

      • Birgitta Berglund

      Pages 141-154

   5. Indoor Air Pollution: Immunological Interactions

      • B. O. Brooks, F. D. Aldrich

      Pages 155-179

   6. Indoor Pollution and Allergic Sensitization

      • Akm Munir, Bengt Björkstén

      Pages 181-199

   7. Chemical Hyper-Responsiveness

      • R. Marchant

      Pages 201-229

   8. Some Studies of Human Reactions from the Emissions of Building Materials and Office Machines

      • Peder Wolkoff

      Pages 231-246

   9. Human Reactions to Controlled Exposures to VOC’s and the “TOTAL-VOC” Concept

      • L. Mølhave

      Pages 247-261

5. ’Sick’ Building Epidemiology

   1. Questionnaires in Exposure and Effect Assessment in the Field

      • Birgitta Berglund, Thomas Lindvall

      Pages 263-273

   2. The Effects of Microbiological Pollution in Buildings — Results of Building Investigations

      • C. A. C. Pickering

      Pages 275-286

   3. Building Epidemiology — Approaches and Results (European Experience)

      • C. A. C. Pickering

      Pages 287-294

Interest in indoor air quality (IAQ) is growing at public, political and scientific levels. Complaints about poor IAQ, associated with acute symptoms such as mucous irritation, headaches and bad odor occur frequently, particularly in the office environment, where typical patterns of symptoms often occur, leading to the coining of the term `Sick Building Syndrome'.
In the present book, internationally known experts address the following issues:

• the dynamics of the indoor environment and strategies for indoor measurement
• chemical and microbiological pollution, important species, sources and detection methods
• effects of indoor pollution, in particular
• sensory irritation, including odor
• airway, eye and skin irritation by organic indoor pollutants and their assessment
• immune effects, including allergic sensitization
• chemical hyper-responsiveness
• controlled human reactions to organic pollutants
• building investigation: approaches and results
• source characterization and control
• criteria, norms and techniques in indoor air pollution, and regulatory aspects.

The complex, multifactorial nature of sick building syndrome requires multidisciplinary collaboration from very diverse fields. It is evident that communication between researchers coming from very different areas, all speaking their own language, is a difficult task. This book, presenting as it does the state of the art on sick buildings and how to cure them, is a sound foundation on which to build for the future.

• assessment
• environment
• epidemiology
• health
• structure

• Joint Research Centre, Environment Institute, Commission of the European Communities, Ispra, Italy

  Helmut Knöppel

• Danish National Institute of Occupational Health, Copenhagen, Denmark

  Peder Wolkoff

Policies and ethics