Dust particles will become

Research by scientists from Canada shows us that urban dust not only pollutes at the mechanical level but also at the chemical level.

With sunlight, dust particles will become "assassins"

If you are a resident of the city, you will often face dirt , from roads, sidewalks to windows or furniture. However, don't think that just cleaning them will make the house clean, things are more complicated than you imagine. Urban dirt can be activated by sunlight and release harmful compounds into the air.

Urban dust not only causes pollution at the mechanical level

James Donaldson, a physicist at the University of Toronto, he spent a long time studying how sunlight influences urban dirt . The experiments performed by Donaldson both in laboratory and outside space conditions showed very surprising results.

Urban dirt appears in any city in the world. They are a mixture of thousands of chemical compounds from construction works, car emissions and factories. These compounds include highly reactive Nitrogen oxides. Many of them can react to produce ozone , a harmful factor to the respiratory system.

Previously, scientists thought that nitrogen oxides would be stuck on the surfaces of dust, and make them unable to spread into the air. However, Donaldson's research has suggested another result.
Donaldson's team performed the experiments, exposing the dust to a source of artificial sunlight. Then, when taking the measurements, they found that the nitrogen compounds released from the dust were about 10,000 times faster than the prepared conditions in the solution. This allowed Donaldson to conclude that there was a mechanism that made nitrogen compounds spread out of the dust quickly.

To verify in real terms, Donaldson collaborated with scientists from Germany and set up a 6-week experiment at Leipzig. They collect dust from the glass doors in the city and place them in two different environments, one under sunlight and one in the shade.

When analyzing the results, the team found that the dust particles in the sunlight contained 10% less nitrogen than the dust particles in the shade. This means that Nitrogen oxide has returned to the atmosphere and there is a high risk of forming harmful compounds.

Dust will be much more dangerous with sunlight

' If the result is correct, we have lost a large amount of data in the analysis and study of urban air pollution issues ,' Donaldson said. Previously, we thought that the dust particles on the roof and the glass, on the windows, on the walls of the stairs were harmless to the air. Just wipe them away and everything will be clean. However, this begins to be more complicated with sunlight.

Currently, the team is analyzing data from a similar experiment in Toronto and conducting additional experiments in Shanghai. The new results will shed more light on this conclusion. Dust samples were also collected from concrete and asphalt surfaces throughout the city.

In summary, research by scientists from Canada shows us that urban dust not only pollutes mechanically but also on chemical levels. In addition, one thing is quite certain: living in the city is not a good condition for your health , this is just a study in countless other buildings warning this.