Glover Sophie, Illyuk Jacob, Hill Claire, McGuinness Bernadette, McKnight Amy Jayne, Hunter Ruth F
Institute of Clinical Science B, Royal Victoria Hospital, Centre for Public Health, Queens' University Belfast, Grosvenor Rd, Belfast BT12 6BA, United Kingdom.
Environ Epigenet. 2024 Dec 16;11(1):dvae027. doi: 10.1093/eep/dvae027. eCollection 2025.
The increasing prevalence of neurodegenerative diseases poses a significant public health challenge, prompting a growing focus on addressing modifiable risk factors of disease (e.g. physical inactivity, mental illness, and air pollution). The environment is a significant contributor of risk factors which are known to impact the brain and contribute to disease risk (e.g. air pollution, noise pollution, green and blue spaces). Epigenetics can offer insights into how various environmental exposures impact the body to contribute to cognitive outcomes. In this systematic review, we examined studies which have associated an environmental exposure to a type of epigenetic modification, DNA methylation, and a cognitive outcome. We searched four databases with keywords "environmental exposures," "epigenetics," and "cognition." We yielded 6886 studies that we screened by title/abstract followed by full text. We included 14 studies which focused on four categories of environmental exposure: air pollution ( = 3), proximity to roads ( = 1), heavy metals (= 6), and pesticides ( = 4). Overall, = 10/14 studies provided evidence that DNA methylation is statistically significant in the association between the environment and a cognitive outcome. Furthermore, we identified that = 5/14 studies performed a type of biological pathway analysis to determine the presence of biological pathways between their environmental exposure and cognitive outcome. Our findings underscore the need for methodological improvements and considerations in future studies, including investigation of other environmental exposures considering tissue-specificity of methylation profiles and stratifying analysis by sex, ethnicity and socioeconomic determinants of disease. This review demonstrates that further investigation is warranted, the findings of which may be of use in the development of preventative measures and risk management strategies for neurodegenerative disease.
神经退行性疾病患病率的不断上升对公共卫生构成了重大挑战，促使人们越来越关注解决可改变的疾病风险因素（如身体活动不足、精神疾病和空气污染）。环境是已知会影响大脑并增加疾病风险的风险因素的重要来源（如空气污染、噪音污染、绿色和蓝色空间）。表观遗传学可以为各种环境暴露如何影响身体以导致认知结果提供见解。在这项系统评价中，我们研究了将环境暴露与一种表观遗传修饰（DNA甲基化）及一种认知结果相关联的研究。我们用关键词“环境暴露”“表观遗传学”和“认知”搜索了四个数据库。我们得到了6886项研究，先通过标题/摘要进行筛选，然后进行全文筛选。我们纳入了专注于四类环境暴露的14项研究：空气污染（n = 3）、靠近道路（n = 1）、重金属（n = 6）和农药（n = 4）。总体而言，14项研究中有10项提供了证据，表明DNA甲基化在环境与认知结果之间的关联中具有统计学意义。此外，我们发现14项研究中有5项进行了某种类型的生物途径分析，以确定其环境暴露与认知结果之间是否存在生物途径。我们的研究结果强调了未来研究在方法改进和考虑方面的必要性，包括考虑甲基化谱的组织特异性以及按性别、种族和疾病的社会经济决定因素进行分层分析来研究其他环境暴露。本综述表明有必要进行进一步研究，其结果可能有助于制定神经退行性疾病的预防措施和风险管理策略。
