Over the last 2 decades, the importance of emissions source types of atmospheric pollutants in urban areas has undergone significant change. In particular, there has been a considerable reduction in emissions associated with road vehicles. Understanding the role played by different source sectors is important if effective air pollution control is to be achieved. Current atmospheric measurements are made at fixed monitoring sites, most of which do not include the measurement of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), so our understanding of the temporal and spatial variation of pollutants is limited. Here we describe the application of a mobile laboratory using a selected-ion flow-tube mass spectrometer (SIFT-MS) and other trace gas instrumentation to provide on-road, high-spatial- and temporal-resolution measurements of CO₂, CH₄, VOCs and other trace gases. We then illustrate the potential of this platform for developing source characterisation methods that account for the similarity in correlation between species. Finally, we consider the benefits of high-spatial- and temporal-resolution measurements in characterising different types of sources, which would be difficult or impossible for single-species studies.

中文翻译：

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使用选择离子流管质谱仪 (SIFT-MS) 表征挥发性有机化合物和大气痕量气体的移动实验室的应用

在过去的 20 年中，城市地区大气污染物排放源类型的重要性发生了重大变化。特别是，与道路车辆相关的排放量大幅减少。如果要实现有效的空气污染控制，了解不同来源部门的作用非常重要。目前的大气测量是在固定监测点进行的，其中大部分不包括挥发性有机化合物（VOCs）的测量，因此我们对污染物时空变化的了解是有限的。在这里，我们描述了使用选择离子流管质谱仪 (SIFT-MS) 和其他痕量气体仪器的移动实验室的应用，以提供CO的道路、高空间和时间分辨率测量₂、 CH ₄、VOCs等微量气体。然后，我们说明了该平台在开发可解释物种之间相关性相似性的源表征方法方面的潜力。最后，我们考虑了高空间和时间分辨率测量在表征不同类型来源方面的好处，这对于单物种研究来说是困难的或不可能的。