Physiologically based pharmacokinetic (PB-PK) modeling of indoor air pollutant degradation by houseplants

In the US, indoor air pollutant levels commonly exceed outdoor levels by a factor of 7 or more. Since people typically spend more than 90% percent of their time indoors, indoor air pollution has the potential for greater consequences on human health. A NASA researcher has reported that certain houseplants will reduce closed chamber concentrations of common indoor air pollutants by more than 75%. The authors are expanding this research; common houseplants and PB-PK modeling can be combined to predict the reduction rates of frequently detected indoor air pollutants, and be used as an environmental remediation approach. The approach to measuring plant gas uptake of indoor air pollutants provides a more quantitative and controlled approach than previous studies. Construction of the closed chamber system linked to a computerized gas chromatograph is complete. This system measures plant uptake of volatile organic chemicals. In experiments using initial concentrations of 21--2,100 ppm of the common indoor air pollutant trichloroethylene (TCE) with peace lily in soil, between 27--34% of TCE was removed during a 12-hour test period. In similar experiments, plants in abiotic potting media removed only 4--13% of TCE from the closed system, suggesting that microbial degradation or soil adsorption of TCE aremore » significant factors.« less