Yael Etzion

On the feasibility of measuring urban air pollution by wireless distributed sensor networks

Accurate evaluation of air pollution on human-wellbeing requires high-resolution measurements. Standard air quality monitoring stations provide accurate pollution levels but due to their sparse distribution they cannot capture the highly resolved spatial variations within cities. Similarly, dedicated field campaigns can use tens of measurement devices and obtain highly dense spatial coverage but normally deployment has been limited to short periods of no more than few weeks. Nowadays, advances in communication and sensory technologies enable the deployment of dense grids of wireless distributed air monitoring nodes, yet their sensor ability to capture the spatiotemporal pollutant variability at the sub-neighborhood scale has never been thoroughly tested. This study reports ambient measurements of gaseous air pollutants by a network of six wireless multi-sensor miniature nodes that have been deployed in three urban sites, about 150 m apart. We demonstrate the networks capability to capture spatiotemporal concentration variations at an exceptional fine resolution but highlight the need for a frequent in-situ calibration to maintain the consistency of some sensors. Accordingly, a procedure for a field calibration is proposed and shown to improve the systems performance. Overall, our results support the compatibility of wireless distributed sensor networks for measuring urban air pollution at a sub-neighborhood spatial resolution, which suits the requirement for highly spatiotemporal resolved measurements at the breathing-height when assessing exposure to urban air pollution.

Live-Cell Imaging in Caenorhabditis elegans Reveals the Distinct Roles of Dynamin Self-Assembly and Guanosine Triphosphate Hydrolysis in the Removal of Apoptotic Cells

During cell corpse removal, dynamins self-assembly and GTP hydrolysis activities establish a precise dynamic control of DYN-1s transient association to its target membranes. Dynamins dynamic membrane association controls the mechanism that underlies the recruitment of downstream effectors, such as small GTPases RAB-5 and RAB-7, to target membranes.

Potential and limitation of mid-infrared attenuated total reflectance spectroscopy for real time analysis of raw milk in milking lines.

Real-time information about milk composition would be very useful for managing the milking process. Mid-infrared spectroscopy, which relies on fundamental modes of molecular vibrations, is routinely used for off-line analysis of milk and the purpose of the present study was to investigate the potential of attenuated total reflectance mid-infrared spectroscopy for real-time analysis of milk in milking lines. The study was conducted with 189 samples from over 70 cows that were collected during an 18 months period. Principal component analysis, wavelets and neural networks were used to develop various models for predicting protein and fat concentration. Although reasonable protein models were obtained for some seasonal sub-datasets (determination errors <approximarely 0 x 15% protein), the models lacked robustness and it was not possible to develop a model suitable for all the data. Determination of fat concentration proved even more problematic and the determination errors remained unacceptably large regardless of the sub-dataset analyzed or of the spectral intervals used. These poor results can be explained by the limited penetration depth of the mid-infrared radiation that causes the spectra to be very sensitive to the presence of fat globules or fat biofilms in the boundary layer that forms at the interface between the milk and the crystal that serves both as radiation waveguide and sensing element. Since manipulations such as homogenisation are not permissible for in-line analysis, these results show that the potential of mid-infrared attenuated total reflectance spectroscopy for in-line milk analysis is indeed quite limited.

Node-to-node field calibration of wireless distributed air pollution sensor network

Low-cost air quality sensors offer high-resolution spatiotemporal measurements that can be used for air resources management and exposure estimation. Yet, such sensors require frequent calibration to provide reliable data, since even after a laboratory calibration they might not report correct values when they are deployed in the field, due to interference with other pollutants, as a result of sensitivity to environmental conditions and due to sensor aging and drift. Field calibration has been suggested as a means for overcoming these limitations, with the common strategy involving periodical collocations of the sensors at an air quality monitoring station. However, the cost and complexity involved in relocating numerous sensor nodes back and forth, and the loss of data during the repeated calibration periods make this strategy inefficient. This work examines an alternative approach, a node-to-node (N2N) calibration, where only one sensor in each chain is directly calibrated against the reference measurements and the rest of the sensors are calibrated sequentially one against the other while they are deployed and collocated in pairs. The calibration can be performed multiple times as a routine procedure. This procedure minimizes the total number of sensor relocations, and enables calibration while simultaneously collecting data at the deployment sites. We studied N2N chain calibration and the propagation of the calibration error analytically, computationally and experimentally. The in-situ N2N calibration is shown to be generic and applicable for different pollutants, sensing technologies, sensor platforms, chain lengths, and sensor order within the chain. In particular, we show that chain calibration of three nodes, each calibrated for a week, propagate calibration errors that are similar to those found in direct field calibration. Hence, N2N calibration is shown to be suitable for calibration of distributed sensor networks.

Night-Time Ground Hyperspectral Imaging for Urban-Scale Remote Sensing of Ambient PM. I. Aerosol Optical Thickness Acquisition

Aerosol loadings in vertical atmospheric columns are commonly measured by satellite-borne or ground instruments that remotely sense the spectral extinction through the optical path. However, correlations of these integrated measurements with ground-level particulate matter concentrations are highly influenced by local meteorology, seasonality, and the surface albedo. Moreover, as most measurements are based on solar radiation, they are limited to daytime. To account for these limitations, we study the feasibility of using a ground hyperspectral camera for acquiring images of artificial light sources through horizontal urban-scale open paths during the night, in order to retrieve the apparent spectral aerosol optical thickness. Laboratory-scale measurements demonstrated a linear response of the camera and set the spectral operational range. A procedure for night-time imaging of illuminating targets through ambient open paths has been developed to enable a consistent selection of pixels for analysis, providing measurable apparent aerosol optical thickness. We demonstrate the validity of this procedure by field acquisition of hyperspectral signatures through different arid and rural open paths in the Negev desert, Israel. An open path of 180 m provided a test case for imaging during clear and stable ambient conditions, from which an inherent measurement error of ∼4% was estimated. Imaging through a very long open path indicated an uppermost open path limit of about 4 km, resulting from a significant attenuation of the sensors spectral response. Imaging and aerosol optical thickness retrieval under common environmental conditions through urban-scale open paths of about 1 km in Haifa is also demonstrated. Copyright 2012 American Association for Aerosol Research

Night-Time Ground Hyperspectral Imaging for Urban-Scale Remote Sensing of Ambient PM—Modal Concentrations Retrieval

Retrieval of aerosol loading in vertical atmospheric columns is a common product of satellite and ground instruments that measure spectral extinction of solar radiation throughout the entire atmosphere. Here we study ground hyperspectral imaging of artificial light sources as a complementary method for retrieving fine aerosol concentrations along quazi-horizontal ambient open paths. Previously, we reported hyperspectral measurements of the aerosol optical thickness in the 500-900 nm range over urban-scale distances (180 m to 4 km), measuring the extinction of radiation emitted from a halogen source. Here we confirm in a laboratory-setup the basic premise that different accumulation-size aerosols generate distinct hyperspectral signatures in this spectral range. Measured hyperspectral attenuation signatures of fine aerosols were comparable to calculated Mie scattering signatures, suggesting that modal aerosol concentrations can be retrieved. A genetic algorithm was adapted to estimate the aerosol modal concentrations from its hyperspectral extinction signature. Retrievals of aerosol concentrations from measured and synthetic hyperspectral signatures indicated a robust algorithm, with an expected retrieval error of 0.2-22% for typical ambient concentrations along an urban-scale open path. The retrieval accuracy was found to depend on the relative aerosol modal concentrations, especially when there is a substantial overlap between the modal spectral signatures.

Analysis of image color and effective bandwidth as a tool for assessing air pollution at urban spatiotemporal scale

Size and concentration of airborne particulate matter (PM) are important indicators of air pollution events and public health risks. It is therefore important to monitor size resolved PM concentrations in the ambient air. This task, however, is hindered by the highly dynamic spatiotemporal variations of the PM concentrations. Satellite remote sensing is a common approach for gathering spatiotemporal data regarding aerosol events but its current spatial resolution is limited to a large grid that does not fit high varying urban areas. Moreover, satellite-borne remote sensing has limited revisit periods and it measures along vertical atmospheric columns. Thus, linking satellite-borne aerosol products to ground PM measurements is extremely challenging. In the last two decades visibility analysis is used by the US Environmental Protection Agency (US-EPA) to obtain quantitative representation of air quality in rural areas by horizontal imaging. However, significantly fewer efforts have been given to utilize the acquired scene characteristics (color, contrast, etc.) for quantitative parametric modeling of PM concentrations. We suggest utilizing the image effective bandwidth, a quantitative measure of image characteristics, for predicting PM concentrations. For validating the suggested method, we have assembled a large dataset that consists of time series imaging as well as measurements from air quality monitoring stations located in the study area that report PM concentrations and meteorological data (wind direction and velocity, relative humidity, etc.). Quantitative and qualitative statistical evaluation of the suggested method shows that dynamic changes of PM concentrations can be inferred from the acquired images.