In situ lysis droplet supply to efficiently extract ATP from dust particles for near-real-time bioaerosol monitoring

[Display omitted] •Direct deposition of airborne particles on a swab sampler facilitates detection of ATP to quantify bioaerosols.•Employing a lysis droplet supply and PMT intensifies bioluminescence enabling rapid reliable detection of bioaerosols.•The ratio of RLU to airborne particle mass (RLU μg−1) is suggested as a measure of the biofraction of PM in air. Simultaneous improvement in detection speed and reliability is critical for bioaerosol monitoring. Recent rapid detection strategies exhibit difficulties with misinterpretation due to signal interference from co-existing nonbiological particles, whereas biomolecular and bioluminescent approaches require long process times (>several tens of minutes) to generate readable values despite their better detection reliability. To overcome these shortcomings, we designed a system to achieve rapid reliable field detection of bioaerosols (>104 relative luminescence units [RLU] per cubic meter of air) in