Low-weight electrostatic sampler for airborne nanoparticles

This paper presents a novel sampler for airborne nanoparticles (NPs). A synthetic aerosol is forced through a tiny tube containing a self-sensing cantilever for attached NPs mass determination. The sampler is miniaturized (tube mass = 39 g, volume = 18.85 cm³) to assure its applicability for personal NPs exposure monitoring Using the first prototype of the sampler an added mass 2.69 ± 0.02 ng was measured under typical test conditions, i.e. airborne carbon NPs of a concentration of 5941 ± 145 NPs/cm3 during a period of 15 min.