Airborne fungi in child day care centers in Edirne City, Turkey Halide Aydogdu & Ahmet Asan Received: 23 June 2007 / Accepted: 19 December 2007 / Published online: 9 February 2008 # Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2008 Abstract The purpose of this study was to determine the concentration, in terms of monthly and seasonal distribution and in relation to meteorological factors, of indoor and outdoor microfungi at selected sites in several child day care centers in the city of Edirne, Turkey. Samples were collected at one month intervals over a period of 12 months between January–December 2004, by exposing petri plates containing Peptone Dextrose Agar with Rose-Bengal and Streptomycin medium to the air for 10–15 min. A total of 2,071 microfungal colonies were counted on 192 petri plates. Thirty microfungal genera (Acremonium, Alternaria, Arthrinium, Aspergillus, Bahusakala, Beauveria, Ceuthospora, Chaetomium, Cladosporium, Curvu- laria, Drechslera, Epicoccum, Eurotium, Fusarium, Mycotypha, Myrotechium, Paecilomyces, Penicillium, Pestalotiopsis, Phoma, Ramichloridium, Rhizopus, Scopulariopsis, Stachybotrys, Stemphylium, Torula, Trichoderma, Trichothecium, Ulocladium, Verticillium) and 75 microfungal species were isolated from the air indoor and outdoor of the day care centers. The dominant microfungal genera were Cladosporium, Penicillium and Alternaria (44.11%, 18.94%, 14.67% of the total respectively), while the genus with the most species richness was Penicillium (26 species). Alternaria, Cladosporium, Penicillium and non-sporulating microfungi were found every month. Cladosporium was the dominant genus in both indoor and outdoor air. Although the predom- inant genus was the same in both indoor and outdoor air, Cladosporium was followed by Penicillium, Alternaria and Aspergillus genera in indoor air and by Alternaria, Penicillium and Aspergillus genera in outdoor air. While a positive correlation was found between the concentration of monthly outdoor microfungi and monthly average temperature, a negative correlation was found between the concen- tration of monthly outdoor microfungi and monthly average wind velocity. Also, some relationships were found between the monthly concentrations of the most predominant microfungal genera (Cladosporium, Penicillium and Alternaria) and various meteorological factors. Keywords Airborne fungi . Child day care centers . Meteorological parameters . Microfungi . Biomass Abbreviations CFU colony-forming unit CDCC child day care center Environ Monit Assess (2008) 147:423–444 DOI 10.1007/s10661-007-0130-4 H. Aydogdu Arda Vocational College, Trakya University, 22030 Edirne, Turkey A. Asan (*) Department of Biology, Trakya University, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, 22030 Edirne, Turkey e-mail: ahmetasan84@yahoo.com