# Particulate Matter During Food Preparation on a Barbecue: A Case Study of an Electric Barbecue
## 3 Results and Discussion
This stability can be attributed to the controlled indoor environment,  
Figure 3: The ternary plot of fraction shares. The direction of ticks and ticks’ labels correspond to axes labels. where ventilation systems and building characteristics effectively limit exposure to both fine and coarse particles [75; 76]. Finally, the data presented in this figure demonstrate that grilling on an electric barbecue can significantly increase PM concentrations, particularly for fine particles (PM\({}_{1}\)). In contrast, the background and indoor environments exhibit lower and more stable particle concentrations due to limited sources of submicron PM, which highlights the impact of grilling on air quality in the vicinity of the cooking area. The increase in concentration observed at the grill is less pronounced than that seen in our previous studies involving gas and coal-powered grills [77]. However, the results presented here should be interpreted in the context of the background conditions. Figure 4: Boxplots of the PM\({}_{1}\), PM\({}_{4}\), and PM\({}_{100}\) concentrations during grilling with calculated values of means, standard deviation, and 95 th percentile. The boxes are from the 1 st to 3 rd quartile, the orange line denotes the median, while the green triangle is the position of the mean. Whiskers are from the minimum to maximum. The concentrations between sites were significantly different (Brunner Munzel test [78], \(p<0.001\)) except for PM\({}_{1}\) indoor and grill (\(p=0.2\)). An examination of the sum of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in Figure 5 reveals a correlation with the observations derived from the particulate matter (PM) analysis. The elevated levels of volatile organic compounds in the vicinity of the grill are mirrored by the elevated concentrations of particulate matter, particularly in the PM\({}_{1}\) fraction. Both VOCs and PM with an aerodynamic diameter of less than 1 \(\mu\)m (PM\({}_{1}\)) are by-products of the grilling process. Our previous study, conducted using passive devices--sorbent tubes [11] --indicated that the PAHs concentration over electric, for specific dishes, are very similar to the lump charcoal-powered grill and even exceed values for the propane-powered grill. VOCs, which are often the result of the thermal breakdown of organic compounds in food, contribute to the mixture of fine particles that are detected in the vicinity of the grill [58]. This correlation indicates that grilling, even with an electric grill, introduces both VOCs and fine particles of PM\({}_{1}\) into the air, which can have implications for air quality and human health, especially in enclosed or semi-enclosed spaces. A study conducted by [PERSON] et al. [79] identified 51 distinct VOC species across various cooking methods and reported that grilling resulted in the highest total VOC concentrations. The study conducted by [PERSON] et al. substantiated the assertion that grills utilising charcoal as a fuel source contribute significantly to the emission of VOCs. However, the experimental setup employed an electric grill. This indicates that even in the absence of direct combustion, grilling results in the release of a considerable quantity of VOCs, which may be attributed to elevated cooking temperatures and the volatilisation of organic compounds present in the food. Further investigation into the emission characteristics of VOCs during grilling with an electric grill could provide a more comprehensive understanding of the sources and mechanisms involved. The relatively low and stable indoor VOC concentrations indicate that the indoor environment lacks significant VOC sources during the measurement period. This finding corroborates the low PM concentrations observed indoors, thereby supporting the notion that indoor air quality remains stable in the absence of combustion or cooking activities. The minor VOC presence indoors may have originated from background sources, such as cleaning products, furniture off-gassing, or minimal outdoor air infiltration [80, 81].