The pollen season in France is over. The Swiss-based startup Plair that developed Rapid-E, the world’s first automatic airborne allergen detection instrument, had system installed in Brussieu (Rhône, France) to track pollen and air pollution in real-time. Positive results were generated.
Many people suffer from pollen allergies especially when plants are in the reproductive stage. In Europe alone, up to 150 million Europeans are currently having an allergy and by 2025 half of the entire EU population will be affected. “Dealing with these patients imposes a significant cost on national health systems”, according to The European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI).
In effort to address this problem, Plair developed Rapid-E (Real-Time Airborne Particle Identifier), an instrument that analyses airborne particles and bioaerosols in real time. Rapid-E’s technology is based on morphological analysis through light scattering, and chemical analysis through high-resolution, laser-induced fluorescence and fluorescence lifetime. Once installed, Rapid-E continuously monitors ambient air, instantly counting and characterizing different airborne particles. The proprietary technology enables rapid species recognition, providing a good understanding of atmospheric aerosol concentrations and their influence on public health and the environment.
On February 28, 2017, the first Rapid-E was installed in Brussieu (Rhône, France) near the coordination center of the RNSA, the French national aerobiology network. Automatic pollen measurements were performed continuously over eight months, from March 15 to November 29. RNSA experts calibrated Rapid-E on up to 15 pollen species and numerous fungal spores specific to that region. As a result, Rapid-E identified and followed the calibrated species over the full season, achieving a precision range of 73-98%. Moreover, correlation with the traditional method based on a Hirst-type pollen trap attained 90%.
“We are very satisfied with the Rapid-E measurements for this pollen season, the quality of Plair’s work and the instrument’s correlations with manual measurements. Next year we plan to make the real-time information measured by Rapid-E available locally,” said Michel Thibaudon, Scientific Advisor at RNSA and former president of the European Aerobiology Society.
(ran)
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