Pollution characteristics and health hazards of PAHs in PM1.0 in the cooking environment

Cooking produces a large amount of particulate matter, which can adsorb PAHs and pose serious health hazards to humans. In this study, real-time monitoring of PM1.0 concentration and measurement of PAHs concentration in PM1.0 were conducted in the urban residential building kitchen, farmhouse kitchen, fried chicken restaurant kitchen, fried stinky tofu restaurant kitchen, Yunnan cuisine restaurant kitchen, Northeast cuisine restaurant kitchen, charcoal grill restaurant kitchen, and electric grill restaurant kitchen, respectively, and the carcinogenic risks of PAHs in the air of the above eight cooking environments were analyzed. In the residential kitchen, the concentration of PAHs produced by cooking and heating with solid fuels in the farmhouse kitchen is about 5.85 times higher than that of the urban residential building kitchen. In the commercial kitchen, the highest concentrations of PAHs were found in the charcoal grill restaurant kitchen and fried chicken restaurant kitchen. Charcoal and electric grill restaurant kitchen mainly produced low to medium-ring PAHs monomer. The fried chicken restaurant kitchen mainly generated high-ring PAHs monomer. The health risk assessment found that PAHs in eight cooking environments posed a high carcinogenic risk to both males and females. The risk of cancer caused by PAHs through the skin was the highest, followed by the intake route. The carcinogenic risk of the inhalation route was negligible. The high carcinogenic risk in males and females through the skin and ingestion was only associated with BaP and DBA.