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Updated: Jun 13, 2026
Measuring Sub-23 Nanometer Real Driving Particle Number Emissions Using the Portable DownToTen Sampling System
Published on: May 22, 2020
Evaluation of a portable photometer for estimating diesel particulate matter concentrations in an underground
Winthrop F Watts1, David D Gladis, Matthew F Schumacher
1Department of Mechanical Engineering, Center for Diesel Research, University of Minnesota, 111 Church Street Southeast, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA. watts012@umn.edu
Abstract:
A low cost, battery-operated, portable, real-time aerosol analyzer is not available for monitoring diesel particulate matter (DPM) concentrations in underground mines. This study summarizes a field evaluation conducted at an underground limestone mine to evaluate the potential of the TSI AM 510 portable photometer (equipped with a Dorr-Oliver cyclone and 1.0-mum impactor) to qualitatively track time-weighted average mass and elemental, organic, and total carbon (TC) measurements associated with diesel emissions. The calibration factor corrected correlation coefficient (R2) between the underground TC and photometer measurements was 0.93. The main issues holding back the use of a photometer for real-time estimation of DPM in an underground mine are the removal of non-DPM-associated particulate matter from the aerosol stream using devices, such as a cyclone and/or impactor and calibration of the photometer to mine-specific aerosol.
