Architectural Design and Indoor Microbial Pollution

Ruth B. Kundsin

ISBN 10: 0195044363 / ISBN 13: 9780195044362

Published by Oxford University Press, 1988

About this Item

nach der Bestellung gedruckt Neuware - Printed after ordering - The problem of indoor pollution has raised concern among occupational and environmental health workers, architects, and engineers involved in the heating and ventilation of buildings. To date, most of the attention has focused on chemical contaminants.This monograph opens up a new aspect of the subject, by examining the effects of modern, energy-efficient architectural design on levels of microbial contamination inside buildings, particularly office buildings and hospitals. It discusses how, badly designed, poorly located, or badly maintained heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning systems can become breeding grounds for fungi, bacteria, and other micro-organisms, thereby causing and facilitating the transmission of airborne diseases to the building's occupants.Architectural Design and Indoor Microbial Pollution is based on an interdisciplinary seminar held by the American Society of Microbiology.

Seller Inventory # 9780195044362

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Architectural Design and Indoor Microbial Pollution
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication Date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0195044363
• ISBN 13: 9780195044362
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 222W x 145H x 23D millimeters 222 millimeters width by 145 millimeters height by 23 millimeters depth
• Weight: 595 grams

About this title

Synopsis

Chemical contaminants and other forms of indoor pollution have recently raised serious concern among occupational and environmental health workers, architects and engineers, and the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Microbial pollutants in the home pose major health risks to adults, children, and particularly the immuno-suppressed, while "sick building syndrome" is a reality for many office workers. This timely book presents an interdisciplinary exploration of these problems by examining the effects of modern, energy-efficient architecture on levels of microbial contamination in air and water supplies. With the common goal of constructing a microbiologically safe environment, the contributors represent the disciplines upon whose combined efforts a solution depends: systems engineering, medicine, microbiology, environmental hygiene, and architecture. Among the topics considered are methods of contamination control in heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning systems; the microbiologist's role --and the techniques used-- in evaluating the hygienic environment; and assessment of water systems used in health care facilities. Proposing methods for the elimination of the health problems discussed, the contributors stress the need for assessment of architectural design and subsequent preventive maintenance of buildings and their intricate heating and ventilating systems; and they show how poor building design and location affects it occupants. Architectural Design and Indoor Microbial Pollution provides public health professionals, microbiologists, and architects with an authoritative resource for assuring our comfort and safety in the hospitals, homes, and workplaces we inhabit.

About the Author

Ruth B. Kundsin is at Harvard Medical School.