Environmental and Toxicology Management

Characterization and morphological study of microbes in treated palm oil mill effluents

2022-12-28T02:07:47+00:00

Palm oil mill effluent (POME) is wastewater generated by palm oil milling. Due to its extremely polluting qualities, it must be treated before being discharged into the water course. This study was aimed to evaluate the bacterial growth of raw and treated POME as well as identifying indigenous microorganisms by determining the morphological characteristics of bacteria that were found in the POME. The bacterial growth was identified by bacterial enumeration of colony forming units (CFU). Besides, the morphological identification of bacteria was determined by using gram staining. The results show the best bacterial growth curve is from serial dilution factor of 10^-6 with a total of 2.24 x 10^-6 CFU/mL in raw POME and optimum growth on day seven. While for the treated POME, the total is 1.97 x 10^-6 CFU/mL and recorded the optimum growth on day ten of incubation. The growth curve indicates the number of colonies in raw POME is higher than treated POME. It concluded that treated POME still has the bacteria although it has been treated. Apart from that, from the morphological identification by gram staining, the bacteria were Bacillus cereus, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus and Micrococcus luteus. From a gram staining, this research obtained all gram positive in purple colour from the POME samples. Two of them in treated POME were in Bacillus shape while the other two from raw and treated POME were in coccus shape, respectively.

Assessment of microbiological growth on surgical face mask

2022-12-28T02:07:39+00:00

Wearing surgical face masks for a long time has a number of physiologic and psychological consequences, as well as the potential to reduce work efficiency. Physical side effects of long-term usage of surgical masks include headaches, trouble breathing, acne, skin breakdown, rashes, and reduced memory. It also obstructs eyesight, communication, and thermal balance. The objective of this research was to investigate the effects of bacteria growth and type of bacteria morphology present on the face mask. Serial dilutions were used to calculate the concentration of microorganisms. As it would usually be impossible to actually count the number of microorganisms in a sample, the sample was diluted and plated to get a reasonable number of colonies to count. Since the dilution factor was known, the number of microorganisms Log CFU per mL was calculated. The CFU count results clarify the growth curve pattern of bacteria formed on agar plate surfaces and revealed some details of bacterial life after their adhesion onto surfaces in the presence of agar. This growth curve exhibited distinct phases: the lag phases, the exponential (log) phases, the stagnant phases and the dead phases. Gram staining and hanging drop method was used to identify the gram positive, gram negative and the bacteria morphology. This study provides insightful on the investigation of bacteria present on surgical face masks which is little available in literature.

Analysis of the influence of environmental factors on the delay in the construction of Maluku traffic office service building

2022-12-28T02:07:43+00:00

The objective of this study was to analyze the factor of COVID-19 and environmental factors that affect the delay of building construction. The construction of the BPKB Service Building for the Traffic Directorate of the Maluku Regional Police in T.A 2020 was a project that spends a very large budget with a planned time of 150 days. Building construction was delayed up to 4 weeks. This building construction experienced a delay of 27.895\% of the work that had to be done. The method used is principal component analysis, which is multivariate and transforms correlated original variables into new uncorrelated variables by reducing the number of these variables so that they have smaller dimensions but can explain most of the diversity of the original variables. The results of the analysis of 25 respondents and 3 variables, namely: building tents to anticipate rain, good and harmonious relationships to prevent unexpected things from happening, and checking the location before making soft drawings.

Indoor air quality and the resident's health complaints after eruption of Mount Sinabung, Indonesia

2022-12-28T02:07:35+00:00

The purpose of this study was to measure the concentration of exposure to indoor particulate matter (PM₁, PM_2.5, PM₁₀), CO_2, RH, and temperature and to evaluate public health complaints due to volcanic ash after the eruption of Mount Sinabung. A correlation analytic was assessed with a cross sectional approach at Payung, Gurukinayan and Perbesi villages from April to July 2021. The level of particles (PM₁, PM_2.5, PM₁₀), CO₂, temperature and humidity were measured by the AS-LUNG type 0019 instrument, Academia Sinica, Taiwan. Respondents' health complaints were evaluated by interviewing respondents using questionnaires. The Mann Whitney U test was used to analyze the differences levels of particles in the area zone. Multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) was used to evaluate the effect between the concentrations of particulate matter exposure on respondents’ health complaints. The results showed that the mean concentration of exposure to PM₁, PM_2.5, PM₁₀ in Perbesi and Gurukinayan villages was above maximum level required by Indonesia indoor air quality guideline No. 1077 while CO₂ was still below the maximum level required. According bivariate test, there was a significant difference in particle concentration between three villages (p-value = 0.00) and in particle concentration between area zone (p-value = 0.00). The MANCOVA test showed that exposure to PM₁, PM_2.5, PM₁₀, CO₂, RH, and temperature has an effect on eye complaints (p-value <0.05), exposure to PM₁, PM_2.5, PM₁₀, and RH (p-value <0.05) has an effect on respiratory complaints, and exposure to PM10 (p-value <0.05) has an effect on skin diseases.

Assessment of microbiological growth on biometric devices

2022-12-28T02:07:31+00:00

Biometric devices are nowadays common in use for a variety of purposes. The current study aims to assess the bacteria growth on fingerprint scanners and morphological identification of the bacteria. The bacteria growth was determined through the colony forming units followed by morphological identification through hanging drop method and gram staining. The results showed the bacteria growth curve for dilution factor 10^-6 showed the most accurate growth curve graph and was chosen for morphological identification. From morphological identification, the bacteria was observed for three days and from observation the bacteria’s growth moderately. Next, from gram staining method, the bacteria appeared reddish which mean its Gram-negative bacteria. Gram-negative bacteria are among the most significant public health problems in the world due to their high resistance to antibiotics so the recommendation is to change the use of biometric devices to more safe ways to avoid the spread of microorganisms in this pandemic era such as using online attendance system and using staff card. This study has been significant because it can confirm the existing of microorganisms on the surface of biometric devices as well as the types of the microbes by determining the bacteria growth and bacteria identification.

Health risk assessment for adult loei residents exposed to arsenic in water and food around an abandoned gold mine

2022-12-28T02:07:26+00:00

This study assessed adult Loei residents’ health hazards of arsenic (As) exposure around an abandoned gold mine. Forty-five environmental samples were collected from 1, 5 and 10 km from the gold mine based on a survey of 371 random adults. Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectrometry determined total As in environmental samples following Thai regulatory limits. With that, a deductive approach was made to assess the health risks using United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) guidelines. As concentrations above the guidelines were found in river water (0.05- 0.09 mg/L), highest in 10 km, and below the guidelines were throughout in public water (0.001-0.006 mg/L), freshwater fish, shrimp and mussels (0.12-.017, 0.15-0.58 and 0.26-0.33 mg/kg, respectively), and rice in 1 km (0.02 mg/kg) but no As in vegetables and fruits. Hazard quotients (HQs) and cancer risks (CRs) of water for daily and agricultural use, and CRs of shrimp and mussels all over were below the guidelines (HQ: 1, CR: 10-6 - 10-4), where HQs and CRs of rice and freshwater fish, and HQs of shrimp and mussels in 5 km (18.0-34.9 year olds) were above the guidelines. The inhabitants are at risk of developing non-cancerous and cancerous diseases via food consumption but through water.