In the last years the number of new forms of workplaces, such as call centers, increases. It is defined as a workstation where the basic tasks of a worker are carried out with the use of a phone and a computer. According to statistics, about 1.3-4% of workers are employed in call centers in the European countries. The noise is one of the harmful and annoying hazards of call center workstations. The paper presents the noise sources in call center rooms, assessment criteria of noise and results of noise measurements in call center workstations. The results of measurements show that the noise at call center workstations (during the use of handset receiver phone by operators) can be harmful (causing the risk of hearing loss) and annoying, as it makes it difficult to carry out the basic work activities and causes additionally auditory disadvantageous changes in health.

The most important factors influencing the human development and health condition are nutrition habits. The quality of food including first of all health safety as well as usable attributes of products often decides about the consumer choice. Safe food should be characterized by both, adequate nutritive value and the tolerably low content of substances which presence could be a risk and threat for health, e.g. pesticide residues. The aim of the study was to estimate long-term and short-term intake of pesticide residues in Polish fruit and vegetables in 2006. The estimation of dietary exposure was based on pesticide residue data from official control of domestic crops carried out by Institute of Plant Protection and on British food consumption data.The estimated dietary intake has shown the chronic dietary exposure of consumers to the pesticide residues in 2006 in Polish crops was relatively low. For fourteen pesticide residues found in apples the long-term intake did not exceed for adult 1.4% and for toddlers 7.6% of the ADI calculated for each compound and respectively 5.1% and 28.3% of the ADI for all compounds total. For eleven residues found in black currants the data were respectively for adult 1.1% and for toddlers 3.3% of the ADI calculated for each compound and 3.3% and 10.3% of the ADI for all compounds total. The long-term exposure values for other 29 commodities were much lower than those for black currant. An acute dietary exposure was estimated for residues of endosulfan in black currants, fenhexamid in raspberries and captan in sour cherries. An acute dietary exposure did not exceed 18.9% for adults and for toddlers 43.2% of the ARfD. The results show that Polish fruit and vegetables are safe in long- as well as in short-term nutrition.

Fruit and vegetables constitute an essential part of human diet and that is why they should be “safe”.

Chemical contaminants of plant origin in food, including the pesticide residues, are defined as critical differentiators of quality and food safety. Pesticide residues are found in fruits, vegetables, cereals and herbs chemically

protected at low concentrations, but they are one of the elements that affect the quality of healthcare.

The aim of this study was to assess the pesticide residues in apples from the north-eastern Poland (Lubelskie,

Podlaskie and Warmińsko-Mazurskie provinces) and get an answer whether any contamination in fruit from the

region is similar to that in other countries and whether it can lead to exposure of consumer’s health. Also assessed compliance of used pesticides with applicable law and found residues were compared with the Maximum

Residue Levels (MRLs). The study showed that 59% of the samples of apples from the north-eastern Poland

contain pesticide residues below the MRL, and 7% above the limits. The estimated dietary intake has shown

the chronic dietary exposure of the most vulnerable groups - children and adults to the pesticide residues in

Polish apples was relatively low and does not constitute a health risk to. The results show that apples from

north-eastern Poland are safe.

The aim of this project was to create a ranking of the nursery schools in Wrocław with regard to the quality of the acoustic environment on their premises, using a specially developed evaluation methodology. Each nursery school was rated according to an adopted grading scale on the basis of the noise level distribution on the playground and on the nursery school building facades. Using the grading scale one can classify nursery school premises into twelve categories characterized by different acoustic environment quality, from exceptionally good (< 45 dB) to exceptionally bad (> 70 dB).

The appropriately rescaled data from the acoustic map of Wrocław and the authors' own measurements and simulation analyses were used. The developed methodology was verified by comparing the ratings yielded by it with those determined on the basis of field measurements and simulation studies, carried out for several selected nursery schools. The paper presents the results of an acoustic environment quality assessment carried out, using the developed investigative methodology, for 118 nursery schools located in Wrocław.

Infrasounds are very common in the natural environment. There are various opinions about their harmfulness or lack of harmfulness. One of the reasons of increasing interest in this issue is that there are more and more wind farms appearing close to building estates which are undoubtedly a source of infrasound. It is reasonable to present the results of research of infrasound noise connected not only with wind farms. In this study own results of research of infrasound noise related to daily human activity are presented. The measurements were carried out during housework, travel to the office or shop, and during shopping. The results are shown in the form of values of equivalent levels and 1/3-octave analyses. Taking into consideration the natural sources of infrasound in the environment, the measurements were conducted during both windy and windless weather. On the basis of the results of the measurements it was possible to define the daily exposure to infrasound noise. Those results were also compared with the available in the literature threshold values sensed by people. Estimated level of exposure to noise beyond workplace together with the level of exposure to noise at work enables to define daily exposure level, which means a better assessment of risk of health loss. Increasing social awareness of acoustic threat in everyday life allows us to identify the problem and at the same time improve the quality of rest and efficiency at work.

A dynamic economy contributes to the increase in the number of workers exposed to mechanical vibration caused by machines and transport equipment. As the means of transport are insufficiently recognised sources of mechanical vibrations, this article presents the results of whole-body and hand-arm vibration tests of 30 most common means of in-house transport. An analysis of vibration signals recorded at each workstation according to PN-EN 14253 and PN-EN ISO 5349 made it possible to determine the weighted values of components of directional vibration acceleration and the values of daily vibration exposure A(8).

In order to assess exposure to whole-body and hand-arm vibration at the tested workstations of in-house transport, indices of vibration hazard related to admissible values, the total evaluation index (developed in a previous study at CIOP-PIB) and a three-degrees scale for assessing exposure to vibrations were used. The assessment showed that the workstations were a major hazard. Vibration hazards at all those workstations were classified as either medium or high.

Landscape is an object of perception, while its image is the sum of ideas on this object. Both terms used in the title of the paper have fairly strong impact on each other. In order to manage the city’s image well, it is necessary to take care of the landscape in all its areas especially in the “forgotten” and degraded ones. The aim of the author was to identify elements of landscape exposure along railway lines – areas with low aesthetic value in many cities around the world. The research area includes railway lines, in Cracow and Wrocław. The method adopted for the implementation of the study is the analysis of mental maps made in 2018 during field workshops. The paper is ended by conclusions on the landscape impact on the image of the city.

The aim of this study was to monitor pesticide residues in the blood of agricultural workers (farmers, pesticide dealers, and spraying workers) living in the Dakahlia Governorate, Egypt. Residue analysis revealed that 48, 76, and 84% of the farmers, pesticide dealers, and spraying workers had pesticide residues in their bloods, respectively. Eleven compounds were detected in the blood of examined individuals. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) classification, most of these pesticides (nine pesticides) were in moderately hazardous compounds. Carbofuran, a highlyhazardous compound was the most toxic. The compound with the lowest toxicity was hexytiazox, which is unlikely to pose an acute hazard in normal use. Chlorpyrifos was found in the blood of 38.3% of the study subjects, followed by acetamiprid (11.7%) and profenofos (10.7%), while fenvalerate was the lowest occurring compound (1.3%). Of the collected samples 41.3% was free of pesticide residues, while 58.7% of the samples was contaminated. Furthermore, the amounts of all detected pesticides were below the no observable adverse effect levels (NOAEL). Also, 38.7% of the samples had only one pesticide, while 8% of them contained residues of two pesticides, and 5.3% contained more than two compounds. The worker’s age did not affect the accumulations of pesticide residues in their bodies. However, there was a strong correlation between pesticide residues accumulation and an individual’s exposure time. Therefore, from these results it can be seen that encouraging greater awareness among pesticide users of the need to improve safe usage and handling of pesticides by education, advice, and warning them of the risks involved in the misuse of these poisonous materials is highly recommended.

During work, earth-moving machines generate significant levels of noise and vibration that can be harmful for the operators; therefore the analysis of the noise and vibration conditions at the driving position is of great importance for the risk assessment. Compact loaders have become a pressing challenge as they are extremely hazardous referring to noise and vibration emissions, especially in their crawler version where further relevant noise and vibration are generated by the hard contact between track belt and ground.

This paper reports the results of investigations carried out on three crawler compact loaders in different operating conditions. The main purpose was to investigate the noise and vibration values transmitted to the operators in some working conditions and use these data to obtain reliable estimates of the exposure to noise, to whole-body and to hand-arm transmitted vibrations, as well as to evaluate the related risk levels. Vibration signals transmitted to the operator were acquired on the seat and the machine control lever in accordance with the procedures specified in ISO 2631-1 and ISO 5349-1. At the same time, noise signals were acquired at the operator’s ear following the procedure reported in ISO 11201. Vibration signals were also acquired on the cabin floor with the main purpose to evaluate the effectiveness of the machine seats in reducing the vibration transmission. Finally, the noise and vibration exposure risks were evaluated on the basis of the health and safety requirements established in 2003/10/EC and 2002/44/EC Directives.

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) levels in environmental media have increased over the last 20-25 years in the world. In aquatic environments PBDEs were found to be accumulated along food chain and Endocrine disruptors toxicity. In this study PBDEs were investigated in sediment and fish tissues from Lake Chaohu in central eastern China. There were 10 PBDEs congeners detected out of all 41 PBDEs. BDE-47 was of the highest with 5.17 ng/g in sediment and 58.47 ng/g in fish. PBDEs were evenly distributed across the surface sediment in the whole lake. It implied that the main source of PBDEs may not be an inflow river like Nanfei. Tissue distribution patterns of PBDEs in four fish species were in the order of BDE-47 > BDE-99 > BDE-100 > BDE-66 > BDE-138 > BDE-183 > BDE-154 > BDE-153. Octa- and deca-BDEs were below the detection limit. The concentrations of all PBDE congeners were higher in gills, livers, and kidneys than those in muscles and adipose tissue. Furthermore, PBDEs in different tissues had some different distribution patterns with fish size. Those discrepancies appeared to be correlated with the PBDEs pollution fluxes varying with the change of the year and their metabolism divergences in fish tissues.

Simultaneous measurements of the indoor and outdoor particle mass (PM) and particle number (PN) concentrations as well as the air temperature, relative humidity (RH), and CO2 concentrations have been conducted in 6 occupied (L) and unoccupied (V) classrooms in 3 secondary schools in Lublin, Poland, in the heating (H) and summer (S) seasons. The schools were located in residential areas where the majority of private houses are heated by means of coal-burning stoves. The ratios of the average particle concentrations in occupied and unoccupied classrooms (L/V) were higher during the heating season measurements. The ratios of the average particle concentrations during the measurements in the heating and summer seasons (H/S) were higher in occupied classrooms. In both seasons the average PM and PN concentrations amounted to 239 μg/m3 and 7.4×103/cm3 in the occupied classrooms, and to 76 μg/m3 and 5.4×103/cm3 in the unoccupied classrooms, respectively. The particle exposures experienced by students were higher in the monitored classrooms than outdoors and were on average about 50% higher in the heating than in the summer season. A positive correlation between mass concentrations of coarse particles and indoor air temperature, RH and CO2 concentrations in both seasons was observed. The concentrations of fine particles were negatively correlated with the indoor air parameters in the heating season, and positively correlated in the summer season.