%0 Journal Article
%T Fragmentation and bond strength of airborne diesel soot agglomerates
%A Sonja Rothenbacher
%A Armin Messerer
%A Gerhard Kasper
%J Particle and Fibre Toxicology
%D 2008
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1743-8977-5-9
%X It was found that the primary soot agglomerates emitted directly from the engine could not be fragmented at all. Soot agglomerates permitted to grow additionally by Brownian coagulation of the primary emitted particles could be fragmented to a maximum of 75% and 60% respectively, depending on whether adsorbates were removed from their surface prior to aging or not. At most, these aged agglomerates could be broken down to roughly the size of the agglomerates from the primary emission. The energy required for a 50% fragmentation probability of all bonds within an agglomerate was reduced by roughly a factor of 2 when aging "dry" agglomerates. Average bond energies derived from the data were 0.52*10-16 and 1.2*10-16 J, respectively. This is about 2 orders of magnitude higher than estimates for pure van-der-Waals agglomerates, but agrees quite well with other observations.Although direct conclusions regarding the behavior of inhaled diesel aerosol in contact with body fluids cannot be drawn from such measurements, the results imply that highly agglomerated soot aerosol particles are unlikely to break up into units smaller than roughly the size distribution emitted as tail pipe soot.Diesel soot aerosol particles are usually agglomerated to varying degrees, depending on whether they have freshly emerged from the tailpipe, or whether they are aged (i.e. have undergone collisional growth) as in the case of prolonged residence times in a street tunnel. The mechanical stability of soot agglomerate particles is of considerable interest. When used as dye, easy disintegration of "lamp-black" in liquid suspension is usually a desired property; as a reinforcement in automobile tires it is generally not. Shear flow induced soot reentrainment in diesel particulate filters has a strong influence on the over-all system performance [1]. In conjunction with the assessment of health risks posed by inhaled diesel soot in contact with tissue and body fluids, the potential for breaking up la
%U http://www.particleandfibretoxicology.com/content/5/1/9