[Determination of ergosterol amount in house dust of different indoor environment in Shanghai City by HPLC].
OBJECTIVE
A high performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method was developed for the determination of the amount of ergosterol in house dust, and was examined the feasibility on determination of ergosterol in house dust. According to the established method, different house dusts derived from different functional indoor air was sampled and determined. We expected to regard ergosterol as an indicator of fungal biomass.


METHODS
We picked up dust samples from nine typical functional indoor area to represent different room temperature, ventilation, air conditioning, human activities, pet-feeding, et al, during Dec 2004 to Jan 2005. The house dust was sampled with a dust collector, and filtrated with a filter. Fine house dusts were extracted by ultrasonic blending, filtration, refluxing, saponification and evaporation. High liquid chromatography was carried out and combined with gas chromatography (GC)-mass spectrometry (MS) to analyze the molecular structure.


RESULTS
A linearity association was observed in the range of 0.02 to 0.8 g/L ergosterol. The detection concentration was 0.0005 g/L. The intra-and inter-day relative standard deviations (RSD) were in the range of 10.2% - 11.7% and 4.54% - 7.34%, respectively. The absolute recoveries ranged between 77.1% and 80.1%. Survey results showed the amount of ergosterol differed greatly from the different sampling spots. The amount of ergosterol had a positive correlation with room temperature and people denseness, while had a negative correlation with natural ventilation, briefly. The highest amount was 66.08 microg/g (house dust).


CONCLUSIONS
The method is sensitive, accurate and feasible. It can examine different ergosterol content in environmental matrix. Followed by GC-MS, the reliability of the results can be further checked. The sampling data show there are different degrees of fungal contamination in typical indoor air of Shanghai City.
Zhou
Xiao-Yu
XY
School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China. 032102076@fudan.edu.cn
Shi
Wei
W
Zheng
Li-Xing
LX
D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000032:analysis*; D016902:Air Pollution, Indoor / Q000032:analysis*; D002681:China; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid / Q000379:methods; D004391:Dust / Q000032:analysis*; D004875:Ergosterol / Q000032:analysis*; D006798:Housing
D000393:Air Pollutants; D004391:Dust; D004875:Ergosterol