This study deals with nanoparticle charge effect combined with charge conduction capacity in relation to meshes. Penetration tests were conducted on charged and uncharged copper and carbon particles (4-80 nm range) and a neutral aerosol using both stainless steel and synthetic meshes. The results of charged, uncharged and globally neutral aerosol penetration reveals that the stainless steel mesh penetrations do indeed obey the Cheng and Yeh (1980) Brownian capture expression. Penetrations obtained for polymer fibre meshes deviate widely from this expression. Moreover, neutral aerosol penetration does not increase steadily as the particle diameter increases. Electrostatic force-based analysis of penetration mechanisms for charged and uncharged particles provides an explanation for these deviations and leads to a proposed fibre charge-based penetration model. This model considers the charge distribution in an aerosol at Boltzmann equilibrium and accurately describes the increase in dielectric media penetration by globally neutral aerosols, which behave differently to particles with no charge. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.