Volume 14, Issue 2, April 2017, Pages 390–400

• Jin Tong^a, b, 
• Xin Liu^a, b, 
• Ronaldo Maghirang^c, 
• Kaiqi Wei^a, b, 
• Linna Liu^d, 
• Chun Wang^a, 
• Yunhai Ma^a, b,
• Donghui Chen^a, b, 
• Hongjia Yan^e, 
• Li Guo^a, b, , 

• ^a Key Laboratory of Bionic Engineering, (Ministry of Education of China), Jilin University, Changchun 130022, China
• ^b College of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun 130022, China
• ^c Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, 66506, USA
• ^d Institute of Military Veterinary, Academy of Military Medical Sciences, Changchun 130122, China
• ^e Department of Planning and Construction, Jilin Agricultural University, Changchun 130118, China

• Abstract

  Vegetative Barriers (VB) have the potential to mitigate air pollutants emitted from area sources, including concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (AFOs). However, the mechanism has not been fully investigated, thereby limiting the application of vegetation systems in practice. An experimental method with repeatable and controllable conditions was developed to measure the change of Particulate Matter (PM) concentrations at upwind and downwind of VB in the wind tunnel and observe accumulated PM on leaves with Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), thus evaluating the ability of VB in mitigating PM emitted from AFOs. Branch-scale vegetation, clove (syzygium aromaticum) was selected because its leaves are one of the major factors affecting PM dispersion. The results show that the branch-scale barriers, as porous medium have the ability to interfere with airflow and reduce PM, which could be influenced by wind speed, particle size fraction and surface area density of clove. Moreover, clove elements could adjust to the wind and the micro structure of clove (such as the hierarchical structures of leaves) affected on the PM deposition. These results indicate that the methods developed in this study may be used to evaluate the potential of vegetation in mitigating PM from stationary sources, and some characteristics of vegetation can be further studied as bionic prototype for exploring engineering application of reducing particulates.

  Keywords

  • vegetative barrier; 
  • particulate matter; 
  • wind tunnel; 
  • clove; 
  • animal feeding operation
• Full text is available at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1672652917300197