A new perspective of probing the level of pollution in the megacity Delhi affected by crop residue burning using the triple oxygen isotope technique in atmospheric CO.

Air quality in the megacity Delhi is affected not only by local emissions but also by pollutants from crop residue burning in the surrounding areas of the city, particularly the rice straw burning in the post monsoon season. As a major burning product, gaseous CO, which is rather inert in the polluted atmosphere, provides an alternative solution to characterize the impact of biomass burning from a new perspective that other common tracers such as particulate matters are limited because of their physical and chemical reactiveness. Here, we report conventional ([CO], δC, and δO) and unconventional (ΔO) isotope data for CO collected at Connaught Place (CP), a core area in the megacity Delhi, and two surrounding remote regions during a field campaign in October 18-20, 2017.

Multifunctional diesel exhaust emission soot coated sponge for water treatment.

We demonstrated that a pollutant and waste, diesel exhaust emission soot (DEES) can be used as an absorbent to remove oil and organic pollutants from wastewater. The diesel exhaust emission soot coated sponge (DEES sponge) was prepared using the dip-coating method. Prepared DEES sponge was found hydrophobic in nature as the contact angle between water drop and its surface was recorded to be 147°.