Pollution of Airborne Fungi in Naturally Ventilated Repositories of the Provincial Historical Archive of Santiago de Cuba (Cuba)

Abstract

Environmental fungi can damage the documentary heritage conserved in archives and affect the personnel’s health if their concentrations, thermohygrometric parameters and ventilation conditions are not adequate, problems that can be accentuated by Climate Change. The aims of this work were to identify and to characterize the airborne fungal pollution of naturally ventilated repositories in the Provincial Historical Archive of Santiago de Cuba and predict the risk that these fungi pose to the staff’s health. Indoor air of three repositories of this archive and the outdoor air were sampled in an occasion every time in 2015, 2016 and 2017 using a SAS sampler. The obtained fungal concentrations varied from 135.6 CFU/m3 to 421.1 CFU/m3 and the indoor/outdoor ratios fluctuated from 0.7 to 4.2, evidencing a variable environmental quality over time, but in the third sampling the repositories environments showed good quality. Aspergillus and Cladosporium were the predominant genera in these environments. A. flavus was a prevailed species in indoor air, while A. niger and Cl. cladosporioides were the species that showed the greatest similarities with the outdoor air. Coremiella and Talaromyces genera as well as the species Aspergillus uvarum, Alternaria ricini and Cladosporium staurophorum were the first findings for environments of Cuban archives. Xerophilic species (A. flavus, A. niger, A. ochraceus, A. ustus) indicators of moisture problems in the repositories were detected; they are also opportunistic pathogens and toxigenic species but their concentrations were higher than the recommended, demonstrating the potential risk to which the archive personnel is exposed in a circumstantial way.

Distribution and diversity of the fungal pollution in repositories of the provincial historical archive of Villa Clara, Cuba

“…This advantageous aspect had a different behavior in the PHA of Pinar del Río, an archive located in the western region of the country 9 and in the PHA of Santiago de Cuba, situated in the eastern region. 49 Regarding T and RH, very similar values were obtained among the repositories. In the first sampling (rainy season of 2017) the values of T ranged between 29.1 and 29.4°C averaging 29.2°C, while in the second sampling (little rains season of 2018) the values fluctuated between 26.5 and 27.3°C with an average of 26.8°C.…”

“…About taxa detected on indoor air of the repositories, a predominance of anamorphs of the phylum Ascomycota was evidenced (Figure 2), which was in accordance with the previous report. 9,16,[49][50][51] This prevalence may be due to the fact that representatives of this phylum have been detected at high concentrations in the outdoor air of Cuba. 49 A total of 10 genera and two non-sporulating mycelia were identified, one white (WNSM) and other pigmented (PNSM).…”

“…9,16,[49][50][51] This prevalence may be due to the fact that representatives of this phylum have been detected at high concentrations in the outdoor air of Cuba. 49 A total of 10 genera and two non-sporulating mycelia were identified, one white (WNSM) and other pigmented (PNSM). Of them, 8 genera were detected in the first sampling and 5 genera were isolated in the second isolation, and non-sporulating mycelia were found in both samplings.…”

“…In the two isolations a marked predominance of the Aspergillus and Cladosporium genera was detected, a result that agrees with others previously obtained in Cuban archives. 9,28,34,52-54 However, Penicillium, a genus that has been predominantly detected in other environments of Cuban archives 49,[52][53][54] and in libraries, archives and museums of other world regions, 50,51,[55][56][57] was only detected in the first sampling. Fusarium, Nigrospora, Rhizopus, Rhodotorula and Talaromyces genera were also detected in the first sampling, while Chrysosporium, Neurospora and Nigrospora genera were detected in the second isolation.…”

“…Although most of these genera have been previously detected in the environment of other Cuban archives 53,54 and other countries, 17,56,58 it should be noted that Talaromyces is the second time it has been detected in the repositories' air of Cuban archives; the first time, it was isolated from the repositories environment of the Provincial Historical Archive of Santiago de Cuba. 49 Figure 3 shows the concentrations of the different species isolated in each sampling. As can be seen, in the first sampling a total of 20 species and two non-sporulating mycelia were detected, but from the three repositories only 11 similar species (55% of the total) were isolated at different concentrations and were: A. flavus and A. oryzae (both species belonging to the Flavi section), Cl.…”