During the great COVID-19 pandemic, millions of people are being tested to see if they are infected with the virus SARS-CoV-2. The test involves a sample being taken deep into a nasal cavity, using a medical swab. Naturally, a sterile swab must be employed, and these devices are sterilized with ethylene oxide in large batches.…
In most gas detection applications, you are dealing with either the ambient open air, source effluent of a very high volume, or a confined entry location which still has no practical limit of the air sample available. In certain cases, however, an application may arise in which the available sampling volume is limited. Most of…
The subject of bump testing was introduced in this Knowledge Base article. While bump testing is primarily a coarse functional test, rather than a true calibration, it is a common practice—especially for confined entry instruments. If many units need to be screened, the time savings of bumping over calibration can be significant. However, we are…
We have long advocated that government and industry refrain from using the metric-looking units—typified by the infamous milligrams per cubic meter—when discussing gas concentrations. The obvious reason is that the volume of a gas is affected by temperature and pressure. Thus, a concentration reading in mg/cubic meter is only valid for a particular set of…
In our Gas Detection Applications Primer, we describe the notion of recommended and regulatory limits, as applied to toxic gases in the workplace. Discussed therein are the OSHA parameters of Permissible Exposure Limit, Action Level, and Ceiling Value. If this “Action Level” is detected during initial monitoring of the occupancy in question, that is the…
One of our older sales reps faced this issue many years ago, on a source monitoring job. His instruments were set up in a trailer, ready to demo to a prospective customer. The customer had provided a nice new cylinder labeled “sulfur dioxide in air, 500 ppm.” However, when this gas was applied to an…
Have you ever heard that “The solution to pollution is dilution”? This little aphorism is usually stated as a sort of inside joke, although it is public policy for radon in residences. We saw this principle in action when home builders affected by the Chinese drywall disaster would sometimes open all windows while the homes…
A complete list of nitrogen oxides would include… Nitric oxide, aka nitrogen monoxide (NO), nitrogen(II) oxide Nitrogen dioxide (NO2), nitrogen(IV) oxide Nitrous oxide (N2O), nitrogen(−I,III) oxide Nitrosylazide (N4O), nitrogen(−I,0,I,II) oxide Oxatetrazole (N4O) Dinitrogen trioxide (N2O3), nitrogen(II,IV) oxide Dinitrogen tetroxide (N2O4), nitrogen(IV) oxide Dinitrogen pentoxide (N2O5), nitrogen(V) oxide Trinitramide (N(NO2)3 or N4O6), nitrogen(0,IV) oxides Of primary…