biology

NASA Clean Air Study

NASA Clean Air Study is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand NASA Clean Air Study rather than just read about it. In short: The NASA Clean Air Study was a project led by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in association with the Associated Landscape Contractors of America (ALCA) in 1989, to research ways to clean the air in sealed environments such as space stations. Its results suggested that, in addition to absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen through photosynthesis, certain common indoor plants may also…

Key takeaways

NASA Clean Air Study belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect NASA Clean Air Study to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of NASA Clean Air Study from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The NASA Clean Air Study was a project led by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in association with the Associated Landscape Contractors of America (ALCA) in 1989, to research ways to clean the air in sealed environments such as space stations. Its results suggested that, in addition to absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen through photosynthesis, certain common indoor plants may also provide a natural way of removing volatile organic pollutants (benzene, formaldehyde, and trichloroethylene were tested). These results are not applicable to typical buildings, where outdoor-to-indoor air exchange already removes volatile organic compounds (VOCs) at a rate that could only be matched by the placement of 10–1000 plants/m2 of a building's floor space. The results also failed to replicate in future studies, with a 2014 review stating that:

While the plant's ability to take up VOCs is well documented in laboratory studies, the effect of plants on indoor air in complex environments like offices requires further investigations to clarify the full capacity of plants in real-life settings.

List of plants studied The following plants were tested during the initial 1989 study:

Variegated snake plant / mother-in-law's tongue (Sansevieria trifasciata laurentii) English ivy (Hedera helix) Peace lily (Spathiphyllum 'Mauna Loa') Chinese evergreen (Aglaonema modestum) Bamboo palm (Chamaedorea seifrizii) Red-edged dracaena, marginata (Dracaena marginata) Cornstalk dracaena, mass cane/corn cane (Dracaena fragrans 'Massangeana') Weeping fig (Ficus benjamina) Barberton daisy, gerbera daisy (Gerbera jamesonii) Florist's chrysanthemum, pot mum (Chrysanthemum morifolium) Dracaena deremensis 'Janet Craig' Dracaena deremensis 'Warneckei'

Additional research Since the release of the initial 1989 study, titled A study of interior landscape plants for indoor air pollution abatement: An Interim Report, further research has been done including a 1993 paper and 1996 book by B. C. Wolverton, the primary researcher on the original NASA study, that listed additional plants and focused on the removal of specific chemicals. A different study in 2004 has also shown that the micro-organisms in the soil of a potted plant remove benzene from the air, and that some plant species themselves also contribute to removing benzene.

Other studies Plants studied in various similar studies on air filtration:

See also Dracaena reflexa Green wall Indoor air quality Phytoremediation Rain garden Sick building syndrome

References

External links 'Interior Landscape Plants for Indoor Air Pollution' Archived 2018-11-01 at the Wayback Machine How to Grow Your Own Fresh Air – TED 2009. An extension of the TED Talk.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with NASA Clean Air Study

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what NASA Clean Air Study claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to NASA Clean Air Study before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about NASA Clean Air Study ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of NASA Clean Air Study

In research: NASA Clean Air Study appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses NASA Clean Air Study in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: NASA Clean Air Study is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1989 works, Building biology, Indoor air pollution, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for NASA Clean Air Study outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study NASA Clean Air Study in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what NASA Clean Air Study means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain NASA Clean Air Study out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is NASA Clean Air Study in simple terms?

Why does NASA Clean Air Study matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study NASA Clean Air Study?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on NASA Clean Air Study.