Airborne bacteria in mushroom growing environments are a potential risk of contamination in commercial mushroom production. Controlling contamination in mushroom farms requires understanding the bacterial ecology in the cultivation environment. This study was conducted to investigate the concentration and species diversity of floating bacteria in a thermophilic mushroom cultivation room. Temperature, humidity, temperature, humidity, and bacterial concentration measurements were performed in April and May 2022 for a Pleurotus ostreatus cultivation house, in July and August 2023 for a Pleurotus sajor-caju and a Agaricus blazei cultivation house, and in June, July and August 2023 for a Pleurotus pulmonarius, Pleurotus sajor-caju and Calocybe indica cultivation house. The airborne bacterial concentration was 5.27 × 103~105 CFU/m3, 3.81 × 102 ~1.37 × 103 CFU/m3, and 2.55 × 102 ~1.37 × 102 CFU/m3 in the three cultivation houses, respectively. A total of 23 genera and 37 species of airborne bacteria were isolated from the three mushroom cultivation houses. 12 genera and 18 species were identified from P. ostreatus cultivation house. Furthermore, 4 genera and 4 species were found from A. blazei and C. indica cultivation house. In addition, 11 genera and 18 species were isolated from P. pulmonarius, P. sajor-caju and C. indica cultivation house. Among the bacteria isolated, the Bacilli class was the most common, followed by Gammaproteobacteria. Among the 37 bacterial species, it was determined that Bacillus cereus, B. licheniformis, Cedecea neteri, Exiguobacterium acetylicum and Raoultella terrigena could negatively affect humans or foodstuff. Cedecea neteri is also known to cause diseases among mushrooms.

This study was carried out to investigate how airborne bacteria are distributed under different temperature conditions while cultivating oyster mushrooms by setting the indoor temperature of the cultivation room to 10°C, 15°C, 20°C, 25°C, and 30°C. The surveys were conducted in April and May, respectively. Airborne bacterial concentrations were distributed in the range of 1.61 × 102 ~ 3.67 × 102 CFU/m3 in April and 5.47 × 102 ~ 7 × 103 CFU/ m3 in May. In May, the indoor air quality maintenance standard (8.0 × 102 CFU/m3) was exceeded in the 10°C, 20°C, and 25°C cultivation rooms. Bacterial concentrations increased significantly in May compared to April. Bacterial concentrations were different between the cultivation rooms at different temperatures. The difference was more pronounced in May than in April. A total of 15 genera and 20 species were isolated from the indoor air of the oyster mushroom cultivation rooms. Overall, it was most abundant in Actinomycetia. Among the species identified, Agrobacterium radiobacter, Brevundimonas vesicularis, Kocuria palustris, K. salsicia, Lysinibacillus fusiformis, and Sphingobacterium siyangense are known to affect human health. This is the first report of airborne bacteria in cultivation rooms at different temperatures used for oyster mushroom cultivation. The results of this study are expected to be used as basic data to understand the indoor environment of thermophilic mushroom cultivation facilities.

Distribution of airborne bacteria in the entire regions of South Korea was investigated and analyzed by region and type of multi-use facilities. At first, 10 public facilities were selected including general restaurant, retail store, public transport, retail market, apartment house, underground parking lot, financial institution, business facility, educational institution, and public toilet, which are located at the regions such as Seoul, Busan, Daejeon, Gwangju, Gyeonggi, Jeju, and Gangwon. The regional distribution of the floating bacteria was identified that Micrococcus sp. was highly prevalent in Seoul (21.5 percent). In Daejeon, Bacillus sp. was highly prevalent (12.4 percent). In Busan, Micrococcus sp. was highly prevalent (22.8 percent). In Gwangju, Bacillus sp. was 9.35%. In Gyeonggi, Micrococcus sp. was 13.7%, and in Gwangju and Jeju, Micrococcus sp. was 11.2 percent and 92%. All in all, Micrococcus sp. and Bacillus sp. were highly detected throughout the entire region and multi-use facilities. Next, whether or not these airborne bacteria could influence the health of people was examined using HaCat human skin cell line which is human epithermal Karatinocytes related to allergic dermatitis. Among these isolated microorganisms, the HaCat cell proliferation was decreased by Arthrobacter sp., Bacillus sp., Brachybacterium sp., Brevundimonas sp., Kocuria sp., Mammaliicoccus sp., Norcardia sp., Prestia sp., Phychrobacillus sp., and Rhodococcus sp., while it was affected by the other bacteria. Therefore, these results have suggested that the airborne floating bacteria could be considered as the marker for the environmental risk management against atopic dermatitis, and it is needed for controlling the bacteria number that suppressed the proliferation of HaCat cells.

A field study was conducted to reduce airborne bacteria by supplying active ions to indoor spaces used by vulnerable human groups spending substantial amounts of time in places such as schools and hospitals. In an experiment conducted during school hours (8:00-15:00), the average number of airborne bacteria in classrooms was 345.53 CFU/m3 or more without active ions. However, ion supply reduced the airborne bacteria to an average of 113.23 CFU/m3, indicating an efficiency of 61.61%. As a result of tests in 33 rooms used for surgery in small and middle sized hospitals, ion supply for 2 to 4 hours reduced the average airborne bacteria concentration from 243.88 CFU/m3 to 104.34 CFU/m3, representing a 41.53% reduction. A laboratory test to confirm the ion activity has shown that the mortality rate of E. coli used as a test bacterium increased with exposure time to ions. The initial colony number of E. coli was 251 CFU, but decreased to 4 CFU after 60 minutes of exposure to active ions. Therefore, it was confirmed that the supply of active ions can contribute to the control of airborne bacteria in the indoor environment of schools, hospitals and other public facilities.

Airborne bacteria are expected to float in the mushroom cultivation house, as it is a special environment with high humidity and high temperatures. Their concentration and diversity in the indoor air of the cultivation house could effect the health of farmers and the quality of mushrooms. To examine whether microbiota of airborne bacteria change from year to year, we measured the indoor temperature, humidity, and airborne bacterial concentration from mushroom cultivation houses located in six regions in Korea from 2020 to 2021, and isolated and identified airborne bacteria. The surveyed data were compared and the bacterial diversity of the 1st year and the 2nd year were determined. Based on the average temperature and humidity data surveyed, it can be seen that the temperature and humidity environment in the cultivation houses is such that bacteria can easily reproduce. It was observed that the temperature inside the cultivation houses tends to be higher or lower depending on the season and correlates with the temperature outside the cultivation houses. In the first year survey, 32 species of 20 genera were identified, and in the second year survey, bacteria belonging to 29 species of 22 genera were identified. Among them, the most detected species were all species belonging to the genus Bacillus. There were only three species (Bacillus altitudinis, Brevibacterium frigoritolerans, and Staphylococcus epidermidis) that were continuously isolated in common. Our results showed that the species of floating bacteria greatly vary from year to year even for the same cultivation houses.

This study examines the effects of surrounding outdoor environmental characteristics in multi-use public facilities that are used by the susceptible population, on the concentration and distribution of indoor airborne bacteria. For this study, areas were divided into ‘factory area,’ ‘city area,’ and ‘forest area.’ The research was conducted from October 2017 to April 2018, and the selected target facilities were daycare centers, hospitals, postpartum care centers, and nursing homes for the elderly. In order to measure airborne bacteria, indoor air samples were collected using a six-stage viable particulate cascade impactor, and airborne bacteria samples were collected using MCE (Mixed cellulose esters) filters. Moreover, the outdoor airborne bacteria concentration was also measured to determine the concentration ratio (I/O ratio) of the total indoor airborne bacteria and total outdoor airborne bacteria concentrations. The results showed that the total outdoor airborne bacteria concentration was highest in the city area, with 74.2 ± 60.0 CFU/m3, and the lowest in the factory area, with 45.9 ± 35.8 CFU/m3. Furthermore, the distribution of the total outdoor airborne bacteria concentrations significantly differed across each surrounding environment (p < 0.05). On the other hand, no statistically significant difference in total indoor airborne bacteria concentrations, according to surrounding environments, was observed (p > 0.05). These findings suggest that the concentration of outdoor airborne bacteria differs across surrounding environments, unlike that of the indoor airborne bacteria.

This study investigated the emission characteristics of airborne particles and bacteria from six types of household vacuum cleaners in the closed chamber. A test cleaner without HEPA filter was examined focusing on the first one minute of initial operation, observing significant generation of airborne particles, and especially for particle size of 0.5 to 2.5 μm, the generation rate increased up to 68.5 × 103 particles/min. Concentrations of airborne particles and bacteria depends on the production year, the motor power, and the dust filter efficiency of the vacuum cleaner. The observed results should be taken into consideration in the design of the vacuum cleaner as well as how they are operated in indoor environment.

This study investigated viability variation of airborne bacteria in indoor environments. The survival in air as a temporal function of bioaerosol viability was reported for Escherichia coli (KCCM 12119, ATCC 11775). Bacteria suspended in distilled water were aerosolized and entered the vertical duct oriented downward. After measurement of number concentration and colony forming unit (CFU) of the bacteria at different locations of the duct, the viability function was calculated. It was found that the bacteria viability(%) decreased with time after aerosolization, 28.454e^-0.132x (x:time, min). This study demonstrated the potential application of viability function of airborne bacteria to studies of exposure assessment and infection risk analysis.

The objective of this study is to quantify the levels of airborne bacteria in pig building according to pig housing type. Mean concentration of airborne bacteria in the housing room of gestation/farrowing pigs were 3,690(±1,528)cfu m^-3 in spring, 10,145(±4,266)cfu m^-3 in summer, 1,546(±835)cfu m^-3 in autumn, and 2,582(±916)cfu m^-3 in winter, respectively. Mean concentrations of airborne bacteria in the housing room of nursery pigs were 11,628(±5,624)cfu m^-3 in spring, 36,054(±13,260)cfu m^-3 in summer, 2,743(±1,688)cfu m^-3 in autumn, and 4,075(±2,300)cfu m^-3 in winter, respectively. Mean concentrations of airborne bacteria in the housing room of growing/fattening pigs were 34,025(±8,652)cfu m^-3 in spring, 36,619(±10,234)cfu m^-3 in summer, 10,230(±3,521)cfu m^-3 in autumn, and 26,208(±5,248)cfu m^-3 in winter, respectively. As a result, mean concentrations of airborne bacteria in terms of pig housing type were highest in growing/fattening housing room followed by nursery housing room and gestation/farrowing housing room (p<0.05). The pig building showed the highest levels of airborne bacteria in summer followed by spring, winter and autumn (p>0.05). Overall airborne bacteria which have particle size over 2.1㎛ (stage 1~stage 4) accounted for approximately 80% compared to total airborne bacteria regardless of pig housing type. The predominant airborne bacteria in pig building were Micrococcus spp., Brevibacillus spp. and G(+) Bacillus.