How Does Air Purifiers Work?

Every day we need around 20,000 breaths to extract the essential oxygen from 12,000 liters of air. The quality of this air has a direct impact on our well-being. Un- treated air is not only dry, but often also polluted by house dust, pollen, cigarette smoke, and bacteria.

Indoor air contains pollutants that can affect human health. Some of these pollutants come from outdoors, and others come from indoor sources and activities, such as cooking, cleaning, secondhand smoke, building materials, consumer products, and home furnishings.  These contaminants cannot be seen by the naked eye but can be filtered out by air purifiers. These purifiers typically use filters, electrical attraction, or ozone purification.

 Air filters use fine sieves that filter particles with air circulation. This filter exchanges the air in the room by using a fan to draw the air through the purifier. The impurities remain on the filter leaving pure air to continue on through the machine and re-enter the room. As air flows into the purifier, the finer the sieve is, the smaller the particles it can trap onto the filter. HEPA air filters are made from very tiny glass fibers that are made into a tightly woven paper. They are guaranteed to trap 99.97% of airborne particles above 0.3 microns. The more times the air passes through the HEPA filter the cleaner the air will be.

TechCare air purifiers can perform followings:

Filtration of particles: The notorious HEPA filters, which is the basis for many air purifiers, removes at least 99.97% of down to 0.3-micrometer particles. The filter needs replacement and in dusty environments, it can be interesting to have a pre-filter to remove coarser particles. They are excellent for allergy control since much of what causes allergies is particulate matter, especially mold spores. But there is a catch there: the mold that produces the allergenic spores grows on cellulose. Therefore, cheaper quality air purifies, where the filters are made of cellulose (cardboard-like) can actually increase allergy-risk.

Killing of germs(whatever microorganism ends up sucked into the device). Thermodynamic sterilization burns them and UV irradiation destroys their DNA. It’s hard to say when these will be critically important out of medical or biological research applications. Most indoor pollution hazards are caused by particles.

 
 
Removing volatile organic compounds(VOC). Activated carbon and polarized-media devices claim to do that. Examples of VOCs are formaldehyde, benzene and methylene chloride. They are airborne in room temperature and can cause serious damage to the lungs, liver, kidney and nervous system.

Do Air Purifiers Help?

In a study involving 35 healthy college students in Shanghai, China, the group that remained 2 weeks in an air purified environment had remarkably reduced biomarkers of inflammation, coagulation, vasoconstriction, lung function, blood pressure and fraction exhaled nitrous oxide.

As for specific conditions, studies show improvement in the health of allergic people. The same can be said for asthma management.

An important benefit of air purifiers refers to cardiovascular diseases. Particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrometers is capable of triggering a chain of reactions (including oxidative stress, inflammation, autonomic imbalance, etc) that may lead to “vasoconstriction, endothelial dysfunction, increased blood pressure (BP) and heart rate, myocardial ischemia, impaired heart rate variability (HRV), repolarization abnormalities, arrhythmias, and enhanced thrombotic and coagulation potential.

Longer-term exposures have been linked to the chronic progression of atherosclerosis as well as the increased incidence of overt hypertension and diabetes mellitus”.

Several claims and recommendations may be concluded from the available epidemiologic and research data. The most important is that if you live in a highly polluted area, you probably want some protection when you are indoors. This was obvious by the amount of research and alarming claims coming from developing and rapidly industrializing countries.

If you are or have allergic or asthmatic people in your home or office, you probably need an air purifier. The world is changing. Clean and nice neighborhoods can become polluted and dangerous very fast. Monitor pollution indicators and, if you are at risk, TechCare air purifiers can be one of the best solutions.