David E.

Steitz
Headquarters, Washington, DC June 14, 2001
(Phone: 202/358-1730)

Cynthia M. O'Carroll
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD
(Phone: 301/614-5563)

Carolyn Bell
U.S. Geological Survey, Reston, VA
(Phone: 703/648-4463)

RELEASE: 01-120

MICROBES AND THE DUST THEY RIDE IN ON

MAY POSE HEALTH RISK

Potentially hazardous bacteria and fungi catch a free ride

across the Atlantic, courtesy of North African dust plumes.
NASA-funded researchers who made the discovery believe the
stowaway microbes might pose a health risk to people in the
western Atlantic region.

Dale Griffin, Virginia Garrison, and Eugene Shinn of the U.S.

Geological Survey (USGS) and Jay Herman of NASA's Goddard
Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, outline their findings in
a paper titled "African Desert Dust in the Caribbean
Atmosphere: Microbiology and Public Health." The paper will be
published June 14 in the journal Aerobiologia.

"The National Institute of Health's National Institute of

Allergy and Infectious Diseases identifies airborne dust as
the primary source of allergic stress worldwide," stated
Shinn. "The identification of microbes in transported dust
is important as they may be a source of respiratory stress and
disease above and beyond that caused by exposure to
particulate matter."

African dust has produced red-tinged sunsets in south Florida

for years. The dust comes every year during northern Africa's
dry season, when storm activity in the Sahara Desert region
generates clouds of dust. The dust, originating from fine
particles in the arid topsoil, is transported into the
atmosphere by winds and may be carried more than 10,000 feet
high into the atmosphere by easterly trade winds. Typically,
it takes 5 to 7 days for the dust clouds to cross the Atlantic
Ocean and reach the Caribbean and Americas.

"The dust events are cyclical," Griffin said. "Studies by

other researchers have shown that from February to April, the
winds bring an estimated 280,000 tons per event to 13 million
tons per year to the Northeastern Amazon Basin. From June to
October the winds shift and typically bring dust to North and
Central America and the Caribbean."

During the peak of the dust season in July 2000, Garrison

collected samples of airborne pollutants and dust daily on the
island of St. John in the Virgin Islands and sent them to the
USGS laboratory in St. Petersburg, FL, for microbial analysis
by Griffin. He compared his results with satellite
observations tracking dust clouds from North Africa. The air
samples with high levels of microbes were collected on the
days that NASA's Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer satellite
instrument observed the African dust sweeping into the region,
indicating that the microbes had been transported from Africa.

"In the week it takes for North African dust to cross the
Atlantic some of the microbes die because of exposure to
ultraviolet (UV) rays of the Sun," said Griffin. "However,
microbes in the cracks and crevasses of dust particles may be
shielded from UV. We also believe that the upper altitudes of
the dust clouds deflect harmful UV rays, shielding microbes at
lower altitudes as they are transported across the Atlantic
Ocean. Additionally, when dust clouds move over open water in
lower latitudes, the moderate temperatures and high humidity
are known to enhance microbial survival."

Florida receives more than 50 percent of all microbe-laden

African dust that reaches the United States. Over the last 25
years, dust quantities reaching Miami have increased during
periods of African drought. The U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency says these tiny dust particles can penetrate deep into
your airways and react with lung tissue. Herman said. "During
major dust episodes reaching Florida, there could be a
correlation with increased respiratory problems."

In addition to the dust itself, even small concentrations of

fungal spores can trigger allergic reactions. A study by M.E.
Howitt of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Barbados documented
a 17-fold increase in asthma attacks in Barbados between 1973
and 1996, corresponding with the increase in African dust
transport to the region.

Fungi and bacteria that survive the trans-Atlantic journey in

dust include bacterial or fungal cultures that do not produce
disease mixed with species that do produce disease in both
humans and plants.

NASA's Earth Science Enterprise Environment and Health Program

at Goddard, a cooperative program with local, state, and
federal and international institutions funded this research.
The initiative uses NASA remote-sensing satellites and other
data to investigate the connections between the world's
environmental conditions and human health. More information
about this research and images can be found on the Internet
at:
http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/gsfc/earth/toms/microbes.htm
http://coastal.er.usgs.gov/african_dust/
-end-