Are you conscious of the increasingly polluted air in your city? Then you must have heard of or bought an Air purifier for your home or office space. This is a portable device that sanitizes the air by pulling unwanted polluted particles. However, a question that may arise if you’re a new user is, “How an Air Purifier Works?”
An Air Purifier helps us to breathe in fresh air by eliminating allergens, dust, and toxic materials. The internal filter works with this device’s fan, and their combined operation pulls in the polluted particles inside the air purification device.
If you are allergic to dust, an Air Purifier can help reduce your allergic symptoms by decreasing the allergen load from your home or office’s indoor air. It creates healthy and fresh air to breathe in, improving your sleep and increasing your life span.
If you are curious about how the whole things work in this device, go through the next part of this article.
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How does an Air Purifier Work?
An Air Purifier in your home or workspace is a healthy choice because an indoor space with this device has fewer toxins, polluted particles, dust, pet tender, and pesticides than outdoor air. Reports show that this type of device decreases these toxic particles up to five times lower than the outside world’s air.
One thing to keep in mind is that an Air Purifier is different from an air filter and even better because an air filter only removes unwanted particles from the air and the circulation; on the other hand, the purifiers remove those particles from air circulation and sanitize the air at the same time.
There are 4 different ways Air Purifiers can clean the indoor air of your living space or workspace.
1. HEPA Filter
- Air Purifiers with HEPA filters have an internal fan to suck air into the machine.
- Then it passes the air with pollutants through the filter.
- When the polluted air or dust gets through the HEPA filter, airborne pollutants and toxins get trapped inside the dense material of the filter.
- The rest of the clean air flows out the other side into the indoor space for breathing.
- The highlighted thing about Air Purifiers with HEPA filters is that they can capture pollutants down to 0.3-micrometer size.
- It removes dust allergens, mold spores, and some bacteria.
2. Activated Carbon Filter
- Air Purifiers with activated carbon filters also work based on an internal fan.
- This fan pulls air through the filter and traps contaminants.
- Activated carbons’ pores allow them to absorb specific impurities from the air.
- This activated carbon is a very porous special medium.
- The porous filter absorbs odors, vapors, and gases from smoke, cooking, and other organic compounds (VOCs).
3. Ionizer
- An Ionizer doesn’t use any filter for its cleaning method.
- It works based on the method of emitting negatively charged ions into the air that latch onto air pollutants.
- The bond between the pollutant and negative ion becomes too heavy to remain in the air.
- The heavy clusters then fall into the ground and surfaces.
- It is a great method for moving airborne pollutants like dust, allergens, smoke particles, etc.
- But the contaminants remain in the room until you clean or wipe them off the surfaces.
4. UltraViolet Light
- This method uses short-wave ultraviolet light that inactivates airborne pathogens and microorganisms.
- This is the only air purification method to kill airborne bacteria and viruses inside your home or workspace.
- When the air passes by a UV light, it disinfects the air by germicidal irradiation.
Air Purifier Advantages and Disadvantages
Every technology has both its good sides and bad sides. Air purifiers are no exception in that case. It surely helps humankind to breathe in the fresh air. But it has its dark sides and disadvantages too.
Benefits of Air Purifier
An air purifier removes pollutants from the air and sanitizes the environment of the room where the purifier is set. However, here are some of the many benefits that an air purifier will bring you-
1. Cleaner air than usual
Air purifiers clean the air by reducing pollutants and other disturbing and harmful particles in the air. And if you are an owner of a pet, then you are aware of the disturbance of the pet’s hair. This hair can enter your body and trigger allergies and cause side effects in your body. Air purifier sucks in these hairs so you can breathe more healthy air.
2. Less bad odors and airborne allergens
There can be bad smells and odors after your cooking or due to water damage to the wall; air purifiers can filter this bad odor of the air and eliminate this nuisance from your home.
3. Creates a calming noise to improve your sleep
An air purifier doesn’t only have the benefit of cleaning the air; it also can make nature’s soothing noises like ocean waves or the noise from the mountains. These calming sounds improve your sleep and even can cure your insomnia.
4. Reduce Stress
It is a proven fact that harmful pollutants increase human stress levels. Air purifiers help to reduce this stress by cleaning the pollutants from the air.
5. Prevent Headaches
Airborne allergens can attack your sinuses and create sinus headaches. These sinus headaches are unbearable, so an air purifier is a great option if you want to get rid of airborne allergens.
6. Fight respiratory issues like Asthma
Air purifiers suck in allergens. Especially the HEPA and carbon filters play a great role in filtering the airborne chemicals and allergens that can cause Asthma. So, an air purifier is a useful device to set up in the room of asthma patients.
6. Kills germs and bacteria
Air purifiers that use the method of Ultraviolet light are very effective in killing germs and bacteria. So, it plays a great role in preventing airborne sickness.
If you are interested, check out these best Air Purifiers for bedrooms.
Downsides of Air Purifier
There aren’t many disadvantages to having an Air Purifier in your work or living space. But you may consider the financial investment as a downside of having such a device.
Another downside is the ionizer method of an Air Purifier can create ozone when they are working, and it can cause exacerbate asthma.
Some devices can even create headaches, sore throat, and difficulty breathing, which sometimes means the Air purifiers you bought, hoping to resolve your health issues, can do the opposite and provoke those health issues.
Hopefully, We have given you the perfect answer on how an Air Purifier works. In short, this device can work in 4 different methods. Different Air Purifiers work differently. But, all of the purifies the air in your home.
FAQ:
Do Air Purifiers help with dust?
Air purifiers effectively reduce dust from the air you breathe inside your home. As I have mentioned four effective air purifier operating methods, the HEPA filter is the most effective in removing airborne particles, toxins, bacteria, and viruses. Besides HEPA filters, most other methods feature mechanical filtration to reduce dust.
Do Air Purifiers help with smell?
As air purifiers work as sanitizers and clean the pollutants from the air, it removes the bad smells and odors from your room. Some air pollutants make an unbearable smell, so air purifiers remove the smell by removing those pollutants.
Are Air Purifiers a waste of money?
Some may think that air purifiers are a waste of money because of their high price. But after using it, I am positive you will think of its purchase as a worthy decision. Despite the high price, it will satisfy you by giving you fresh air.
Do Air Purifiers work for allergies?
Air purifiers effectively remove allergens and other airborne particles that can cause allergies, such as dust, viruses, bacteria, etc. But some air purifiers can sometimes trigger your allergies instead of reducing them. So you should be careful in choosing your air purifier.
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