Centre for Environmental Health (MGO), National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), Bilthoven, The Netherlands.
PLoS One. 2013;8(3):e58944. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0058944. Epub 2013 Mar 13.
Exposure to ambient particulate matter (PM) has been associated with adverse cardiovascular effects in epidemiological studies. Current knowledge of independent effects of individual PM characteristics remains limited.
Using a semi-experimental design we investigated which PM characteristics were consistently associated with blood biomarkers believed to be predictive of the risk of cardiovascular events. We exposed healthy adult volunteers at 5 different locations chosen to provide PM exposure contrasts with reduced correlations among PM characteristics. Each of the 31 volunteers was exposed for 5 h, exercising intermittently, 3-7 times at different sites from March to October 2009. Extensive on-site exposure characterization included measurements of PM mass and number concentration, elemental- (EC) and organic carbon (OC), trace metals, sulfate, nitrate, and PM oxidative potential (OP). Before and 2 h and 18 h after exposure we measured acute vascular blood biomarkers - C-reactive protein, fibrinogen, platelet counts, von Willebrand Factor, and tissue plasminogen activator/plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 complex. We used two-pollutant models to assess which PM characteristics were most consistently associated with the measured biomarkers.
We found OC, nitrate and sulfate to be most consistently associated with different biomarkers of acute cardiovascular risk. Associations with PM mass concentrations and OP were less consistent, whereas other measured components of the air pollution mixture, including PNC, EC, trace metals and NO2, were not associated with the biomarkers after adjusting for other pollutants.
流行病学研究表明，暴露于环境颗粒物（PM）与不良心血管效应有关。目前，对于个别 PM 特征的独立影响的了解仍然有限。
我们采用半实验设计，研究了哪些 PM 特征与血液生物标志物有关，这些生物标志物被认为是预测心血管事件风险的指标。我们选择了 5 个不同的地点，让健康的成年志愿者在这些地点暴露，以提供 PM 暴露对比，同时减少 PM 特征之间的相关性。31 名志愿者中的每一位都在 2009 年 3 月至 10 月期间在不同地点进行了 5 小时的间歇性运动暴露。现场暴露特征的广泛描述包括 PM 质量和数量浓度、元素碳（EC）和有机碳（OC）、痕量金属、硫酸盐、硝酸盐和 PM 氧化潜力（OP）的测量。暴露前和暴露后 2 小时和 18 小时，我们测量了急性血管血液生物标志物——C 反应蛋白、纤维蛋白原、血小板计数、血管性血友病因子和组织型纤溶酶原激活物/纤溶酶原激活物抑制剂-1 复合物。我们使用双污染物模型来评估哪些 PM 特征与测量的生物标志物最一致。
我们发现 OC、硝酸盐和硫酸盐与急性心血管风险的不同生物标志物最一致相关。与 PM 质量浓度和 OP 的关联不太一致，而其他测量的空气污染混合物成分，包括 PNC、EC、痕量金属和 NO2，在调整其他污染物后，与生物标志物没有关联。
