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SUMMARY: The effects of holding time and relative humidity on the survival of populations recovered from aerosols of Escherichia coli strain B was examined. β-Galactosidase was chosen as a convenient model of a bacterial protein in this organism. Populations recovered from aerosols of E. coli strain B were shown: (i) to have suffered no detectable damage to β-galactosidase; (ii) to have suffered a temporary and severe loss of ability to synthesize β-galactosidase. The significance of these results in identifying lethal mechanisms in bacterial aerosols is discussed. For these studies a method was developed for the determination of total bacterial numbers recovered from aerosols by labelling the organisms directly with [14C]. Bacillus globigii was shown to be unsuitable as a tracer for the determination of total numbers in biological aerosols.
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