In recent years, much attention has been drawn to the exposure to bioaerosols in both occupational and indoor environments due to adverse effects on human health. Exposure to these agents may cause infectious diseases, allergic diseases, acute toxic effects, respiratory diseases, neurological effects, and cancer. Bioaerosols play a significant role in air quality studies, as well as in industrial and agricultural regulations. There is a diversity of sources for bioaerosol exposures, which include occupational activities such as waste disposal, sorting and composting, agricultural and food processing, livestock production and handling, healthcare, and fungal growth following flooding. Bioaerosol monitoring includes the measurement of viable (culturable and nonculturable) and nonviable microorganisms in both indoor and outdoor environments. The development of standardized methods for the detection and quantitation of bioaerosols has become an important issue. Technologies, including microbial plating, physical-chemical assays, and molecular techniques, have been adapted for the assessment of collected bioaerosol particles. In this review, we will discuss traditional and modern assays that have been applied in bioaerosol enumeration based on culturability, optical properties, immunoreactions, and nucleic acid amplification and sequencing of biological particles. The analysis of additional characteristics of bioaerosols including microbiome and antimicrobial resistance is also discussed. Finally, concluding thoughts are offered regarding the challenges and perspectives in the field.

A combination of type A (high flow model) or B (low flow model) shrouded probe and appropriate isokinetic air-sampler (IAS) was tested in a wind tunnel that was optimized for high air speed testing using computational flow modeling. Liquid uranine aerosols (LUA) with AED (aerodynamic equivalent diameter) of 10 lm were generated at a constant flow rate using a vibrating orifice aerosol generator. The monodispersed aerosols were introduced into a wind tunnel at speeds of 5, 10, 15 and 20 m/s. The high flow (A) or low flow (B) model shrouded probe and the appropriate isokinetic air-sampler (IAS) was co-located to collect the LUA simultaneously during each treatment. After the test, the LUA deposited on the filters and inside the walls of the two air-samplers were collected and analyzed for fluorescence intensity units to determine the wall loss, transmission and aspiration ratios. While the type B shrouded probe had 20% (at 10 m/s) and 14.3% (at 15 m/s) higher wall loss ratios than model A, it had 16.1% (at 10 m/s) and 11.6% (at 15 m/s) higher transmission ratios compared to model A. Similarly, probe B had 17.6% (at 10 m/s) and 14.6% (at 15 m/s) higher aspiration ratios than probe A at similar air velocities. Overall, the wall loss, transmission and aspiration ratios of 10 mm AED ULA measured with two types of shrouded probes at 5, 10, 15 and 20 m/s air velocities in the optimized wind tunnel had good agreement with the range of standard data.