Atmospheric Modeling & Weather Forecasting Group

Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic

The Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic is the leading Aerosol Laboratory in the Czech Republic. The main effort is aimed at experimental study of individual parts of the condensation process (nucleation, condensation and evaporation, heat and mass transfer) as well as at more complex phenomena such as gas-phase synthesis of nanoparticles, and combustion or atmospheric aerosols. The Laboratory co-operates with many Aerosol Laboratories abroad (e.g. "Condensation processes as a part of gas-to-particle conversion" - University of Helsinki, Department of Physics "Application of low pressure impactors in aerosol measurements" – Finnish Meteorological Institute "Nucleation in supersaturated vapours" – Philipps University, Marburg, Germany). Recently, Laboratory coordinated campaign of measurements of composition of size classified urban aerosol in Prague (with Finnish Meteorological Institute, Czech Hydrometeorological Institute, Prague, Charles University, Faculty of Science, Prague, and Nuclear Physics Institute, Rez, Czech Republic). The Laboratory, that is the seat of the Czech Aerosol Society, is co-organizer of the European Aerosol Conference, 1999, Prague.

The Institute has the experience regarding the development of measurement methodology for air pollution in these fields: the pre-concentration of pollutants, the measurements for NH3, SO2, NO2, HNO2, HNO3 and O3 determination in ambient air. The group has got a long-time standing experience in field measurements and in pollutant monitoring campaigns. The department owns: unique analyzers for monitoring ozone, nitrogen dioxide and nitrous and nitric acids, GC-MS Fisons with an autosampler. LC/MSn Esquire system (Bruker Daltonics) will also be available for project.

The participating members of the Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals in the present proposal are:

Dr. Ji?í Smolík (Project Leader) is Head of the Department of Reaction Engineering in Gas Phase in the Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals AS CR, Czech Republic. Ph.D.- Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals AS CR, Prague, 1972. His research is focused mainly on fundamental research on condensation processes: nucleation, condensational growth and evaporation of particles, thermo- and diffusiophoresis, transfer processes in dispersed systems, gas-phase synthesis of nanoparticles, combustion and atmospheric aerosols. Principal investigator or co-investigator of the following research projects: "Thermophoresis and diffusiophoresis of aerosol particles" (1992-94), "Gas-phase synthesis of fine particles" (1993-95), "Mass transfer from evaporating drops" (1995-97), "Emission fluxes of heavy metals from the fluidised bed combustion of fossil fuels" (1995-1997), "Experimental study of homogeneous nucleation in supersaturated vapours" (1997-99). Long term experience in co-ordinating of complex research projects. Organiser and co-organiser of 6 international conferences. Supervising M.S. and Ph.D. theses. Member of the Czech Aerosol Society, Czech Society of Chemical Engineering, German Society for Aerosol Research, member of the following working groups of European Aerosol Assembly: Basic Aerosol Science, Nano-particles, High-Temperature Aerosols, member of the International Committee on Nucleation and Atmospheric Aerosols. Author or co-author of 60 scientific papers, 23 patents, and 70 contributions on international conferences.
Dr. Jaroslav Schwarz is a research scientist in Laboratory of Condensational Process, Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals AS CR. Ph.D. in chemical engineering, Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals AS CR Prague, 1995. His Ph.D. study dealt with mass transfer and phase changes at a drop evaporating in multicomponent gaseous mixture. Since 1995 he is involved in study of particle emissions from fluidised bed combustion and vehicle emissions. He was principal investigator of a grant project GA AS CR "Mass transfer from evaporating drops" (1995-97), and co-investigator of a project GA CR"Emission fluxes of heavy metals from the fluidised bed combustion of fossil fuels". Since 1998 he coordinates comparative study of sampling devices and analytical methods done in the field of atmospheric aerosols. Supervising M.Sc. thesis, undergraduate students in IAESTE program. He is author or co-author of 11 scientific papers and about 25 contributions on international conferences.
Dr. Zbyn?k Ve?e?a with MS in organic chemistry in 1977 from the Technical University in Bratislava. In 1977 he joined Institute of Analytical chemistry of Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in Brno, 1982 received PhD degree. In 1983 he joined the group of prof. J. Janak , where has been working on trace analysis problems (pollutants in the air) with particular respect to the methods of continuous preconcentration of pollutants from gaseous media to liquid system (the mass transfer of pollutants to aerosol or thin film of the liquids). From 1989 till May 1991 – he had joined prof. Dasgupta’s group, Department of Analytical Chemistry, Lubbock, Texas. Currently he is the head of Department of Environmental Analytical Chemistry. Activity - 27 publications and one patent application. Coordinator of project GA ?R " Real time" analytical chemistry of forest non-methane hydrocarbons using wet effluent diffusion denuder technique. GA?R 203/98/0943, co-operator project : cycling trace metals in sustainable management of agricultural soils. Fertility requires the inventory of input metals. INCO Copernicus, ERB IC15-CT98-0124
Dr. Pavel Mikuška is graduated from the Department of Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Purkyn? University (today’s Masaryk University) in Brno in 1987 and received his RNDr. degree (Rer. Nat. Dr.). Since 1987 he has been working at the Institute of Analytical Chemistry, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic in Brno at the Department of Environmental Analysis. In 1992 he received Ph.D. degree in analytical chemistry after defence the thesis "Determination of nitrogen dioxide in air with a chemiluminescent aerosol detector". In 1996 he worked at Environment Department, Netherlands Energy Research Foundation (ECN) in Petten, The Netherlands, headed by Prof. Dr. J. Slanina. His research interests include the determination of trace concentrations of gaseous pollutants in air with respect to the methods of continuous preconcentration of gaseous pollutants from gaseous to liquid phase and the monitoring of photochemical smog oxidants. He is author or co-author of 11 publications.
Dr. Zbyn?k Zdráhal received his M.S. degree in analytical chemistry from the Masaryk University of Brno in 1988, diploma thesis Determination of Trace Amounts of Copper by Flow Injection System with Flame Atomic Absorption Spectrometry. Since 1988 he has worked in the Institute of Analytical Chemistry in Brno. He defended his dissertation thesis Preconcentration of Organic Compounds from Air by Wet Effluent Diffusion Denuders and he received Ph.D. degree at Masaryk University, Brno in 1995. Nowadays, his research interests include analysis of organics in environmental matrices by GC/MS. He is author (or co-author) of 10 original papers.

The Czech contribution will be focused on sampling and measurements of aerosols with use of Berner low pressure impactor and DMPS from TSI. Furthermore, additional instruments (PM 2.5, PM10 samplers etc) and analytical services (ICP MS, PIXE, INAA) will be used.

Selected References

P. Mikuska, Z. Vecera, J. Janak., The survey of Methods for the Determination of Ozone Atmosphere and Residual Ozone in Water., Chem. Listy, 86, 407-419, 1992.
Z. Vecera, and P.K. Dasgupta., Measurement of Ambient Nitrous Acid and a Reliable Calibration Source for Gaseous Nitrous Acid., Environ. Sci. Technol., 25, 255-260, 1991.
P.K. Simon, P.K. Dasgupta and Z. Vecera., Wet Effluent Denuder Coupled Liquid /Ion Chromatography Systems., Anal. Chem. 63, 1237-1242, 1991.
Z. Vecera and P.K. Dasgupta., Measurement of Atmospheric Nitric and Nitrous Acids with a Wet Effluent Diffusion Denuder and Low-Pressure Ion Chromatography-Post column Reaction Detection. Anal. Chem. 63, 2210-2216, 1991.
P. Mikuska, Z. Vecera., Determination of Nitrogen Dioxide with a Chemiluminescent Aerosol Detector. Anal. Chem. 64, 2187-2191, 1992.
Z. Zdrahal, Z. Vecera., Preconcentration and determination of 2,4,5-trichlorophenol in air using a wet effluent denuder and high-performance liquid chromatography., J. Chromatogr. 282, 372-374, 1994.
Z. Zdrahal, P. Mikuska and Z. Vecera., Application of Diffusion Denuders to Preconcentration of Gaseuos Organic Pollutants from Air, Chem. Listy 88, 353-359, 1994.
Z. Zdrahal, P. Mikuska and Z. Vecera., Organic Solvents with Wet Effluent Diffusion Denuder for Preconcentration of 1,4 -Dichlorobenzene from Air., Anal. Chem., 67, 2763-2766, 1995.
Opekar, F., Ve?e?a Z., Janák, J., Pmeumatoamperometric determination of sulfur dioxide in air on ppb level , Inter. J. Environ. Anal. Chem., 27 123-135, 1986.
Ve?e?a, Z., Janák, J., Continuous areodispersive enrichment unit for trace determination of pollutants in air, Anal. Chem., 59, 1494-1498, 1987.
Mikuška, P., Ve?e?a Z and Janák J., Survey of methods for monitoring of NOx in air, Chem. Listy., 84, 1249-1265, 1990.
Janák, J and Ve?e?a Z, A monitor for atmospheric sulphur dioxide, based on enrichment of SO2 by a polydispersive water aerosol., Microchim Acta (Wien) III (1/3), 29-34, 1990.
Mikuška P., Ve?e?a Z., Zdráhal Z, Flow-injection chemiluminescence determination of ultra low concentrations of nitrite in water.,Anal. Chim. Acta. 316, 261-268, 1995.
Mikuška P., Ve?e?a Z, Application of gallic acid and xanthene dyes for determination of ozone in air with a chemiluminescence aerosol detector. Anal. Chim. Acta. 374, 297-302, 1998.