A personal diffusive sampler for occupational acetone vapor exposure monitoring

A commercially produced badge-type personal sampler, with water as absorbent and originally designed for monitoring of formaldehyde, was investigated for possible application to monitoring of occupational exposure to acetone, one of the hydrophilic solvents which cannot be monitored so far with activated carbon cloth-equipped diffusive samplers. Under the experimental condition of exposure at constant acetone concentration, the amount of acetone absorbed was proportional to the acetone exposure concentration up to 1500 ppm and duration of exposure for up to 8 h. Inter-sampler variation became wider, however, at 8 h of exposure to 1500 ppm acetone. Loss of acetone in the absorbent water due to spontaneous desorption became significant at 6 h after acetone impregnation of absorbent water. In practice, therefore, limitation of the duration of exposure up to 4 h is recommended.