Articles

Assessment of total, ligand-induced peroxisome proliferator activated receptor γ ligand activity in serum

Humans are exposed to a complex mixture of environmental chemicals that impact bone and metabolic health, and traditional exposure assessments struggle to capture these exposure scenarios. Peroxisome prolifera...

Authors: Lariah Edwards, James Watt, Thomas F. Webster and Jennifer J. Schlezinger

Fetal growth in environmental epidemiology: mechanisms, limitations, and a review of associations with biomarkers of non-persistent chemical exposures during pregnancy

Non-persistent chemicals, such as phthalates, environmental phenols, organophosphate pesticides, and others, are challenging to study because of their ubiquity in the environment, diverse exposure routes, and ...

Authors: Elizabeth M. Kamai, Thomas F. McElrath and Kelly K. Ferguson

Historical evidence of glyphosate exposure from a US agricultural cohort

In response to the recent review by Gillezeau et al., The evidence of human exposure to glyphosate: A review, Environmental Health 1/19/19, here we report additional glyphosate biomonitoring data from a repositor...

Authors: Melissa J. Perry, Daniele Mandrioli, Fiorella Belpoggi, Fabiana Manservisi, Simona Panzacchi and Courtney Irwin

Challenging dominant breast cancer research agendas: perspectives on the outcomes of the interagency breast cancer and environment research coordinating committee

As breast cancer rates increase globally, there is growing scientific consensus that greater understanding of the causes of breast cancer is needed to better prevent its occurrence. Genetics accounts for a sma...

Authors: Lauren Richter

Applying a cumulative risk framework to drinking water assessment: a commentary

The health risks of drinking water contaminants and the economic benefits of drinking water standards are typically assessed one chemical at a time, an approach that misses the health impacts of co-occurring c...

Authors: Tasha Stoiber, Alexis Temkin, David Andrews, Chris Campbell and Olga V. Naidenko

Assessing the magnitude and uncertainties of the burden of selected diseases attributable to extreme heat and extreme precipitation under a climate change scenario in Michigan for the period 2041–2070

Extreme heat (EH) and extreme precipitation (EP) events are expected to increase with climate change in many parts of the world. Characterizing the potential future morbidity and mortality burden of EH and EP ...

Authors: Carina J. Gronlund, Lorraine Cameron, Claire Shea and Marie S. O’Neill

Considerations in the use of different spirometers in epidemiological studies

Spirometric lung function measurements have been proven to be excellent objective markers of respiratory morbidity. The use of different types of spirometers in epidemiological and clinical studies may present...

Authors: Edith B. Milanzi, Gerard H. Koppelman, Marieke Oldenwening, Sonja Augustijn, Bernadette Aalders-de Ruijter, Martijn Farenhorst, Judith M. Vonk, Marjan Tewis, Bert Brunekreef and Ulrike Gehring

A tensor product quasi-Poisson model for estimating health effects of multiple ambient pollutants on mortality

People are exposed to mixtures of highly correlated gaseous, liquid and solid pollutants. However, in previous studies, the assessment of air pollution effects was mainly based on single-pollutant models or wa...

Authors: Li-Jun Xu, Shuang-Quan Shen, Li Li, Ting-Ting Chen, Zhi-Ying Zhan and Chun-Quan Ou

Carbon monoxide and risk of outpatient visits due to cause-specific diseases: a time-series study in Yichang, China

Previous studies showed inconsistent results on risk of increased outpatient visits for cause-specific diseases associated with ambient carbon monoxide (CO).

Authors: Yu Wang, Chengye Yao, Chengzhong Xu, Xinying Zeng, Maigeng Zhou, Yun Lin, Pei Zhang and Peng Yin

Estimating policy-relevant health effects of ambient heat exposures using spatially contiguous reanalysis data

Regional National Weather Service (NWS) heat advisory criteria in New York State (NYS) were based on frequency of heat events estimated by sparse monitoring data. These may not accurately reflect temperatures ...

Authors: Temilayo E. Adeyeye, Tabassum Z. Insaf, Mohammad Z. Al-Hamdan, Seema G. Nayak, Neil Stuart, Stephen DiRienzo and William L. Crosson

Particulate air pollution on cardiovascular mortality in the tropics: impact on the elderly

Air pollution has a significant health impact. Most data originate from temperate regions. We aim to study the health impact of air pollution, particularly among the elderly, in a tropical region.

Authors: Jonathan Yap, Yixiang Ng, Khung Keong Yeo, Anders Sahlén, Carolyn Su Ping Lam, Vernon Lee and Stefan Ma

Para-occupational exposure to pesticides, PON1 polymorphisms and hypothyroxinemia during the first half of pregnancy in women living in a Mexican floricultural area

Adequate maternal thyroxine (T4) concentrations during the first half of pregnancy are fundamental to the embryo’s or fetus’ neural development. Organophosphate pesticides (OP) can act as thyroid disruptors an...

Authors: Luisa Torres-Sánchez, Ricardo Gamboa, Susana Bassol-Mayagoitia, Claudia Huesca-Gómez, Martha Patricia Nava, Jennifer Illian Vázquez-Potisek, Leticia Yáñez-Estrada, Rebeca Mejía-Saucedo and Julia Blanco-Muñoz

Letter to the editor re: the CDC blood lead reference value for children

Authors: Perry Gottesfeld and Deborah A. Cory-Slechta

Methods to account for uncertainties in exposure assessment in studies of environmental exposures

Accurate exposure estimation in environmental epidemiological studies is crucial for health risk assessment. Failure to account for uncertainties in exposure estimation could lead to biased results in exposure...

Authors: You Wu, F. Owen Hoffman, A. Iulian Apostoaei, Deukwoo Kwon, Brian A. Thomas, Racquel Glass and Lydia B. Zablotska

Screening of noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL)-associated SNPs and the assessment of its genetic susceptibility

The aim of this study was to screen for noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL)-associated single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and to construct genetic risk prediction models for NIHL in a Chinese population.

Authors: Xuhui Zhang, Yaqin Ni, Yi Liu, Lei Zhang, Meibian Zhang, Xinyan Fang, Zhangping Yang, Qiang Wang, Hao Li, Yuyong Xia and Yimin Zhu

Response to Juberg et al.

Authors: Axel Mie, Christina Rudén and Philippe Grandjean

A repeated measures study of phenol, paraben and Triclocarban urinary biomarkers and circulating maternal hormones during gestation in the Puerto Rico PROTECT cohort

Prenatal exposure to some phenols and parabens has been associated with adverse birth outcomes. Hormones may play an intermediate role between phenols and adverse outcomes. We examined the associations of phen...

Authors: Amira M. Aker, Kelly K. Ferguson, Zaira Y. Rosario, Bhramar Mukherjee, Akram N. Alshawabkeh, Antonia M. Calafat, José F. Cordero and John D. Meeker

Head and neck cancer and occupational exposure to leather dust: results from the ICARE study, a French case-control study

Leather dust is an established carcinogen of the sinonasal cavities; however, evidence is lacking regarding its association with other head and neck cancers (HNC). To date, few studies have been conducted on t...

Authors: Loredana Radoï, Fatoumata Sylla, Mireille Matrat, Christine Barul, Gwenn Menvielle, Patricia Delafosse, Isabelle Stücker and Danièle Luce

Fluoride exposure and pubertal development in children living in Mexico City

Previous animal and ecological studies have provided evidence for an earlier sexual maturation in females in relation to fluoride exposure; however, no epidemiological studies have examined the association bet...

Authors: Yun Liu, Martha Téllez-Rojo, Howard Hu, Brisa N. Sánchez, E. Angeles Martinez-Mier, Niladri Basu, Adriana Mercado-García, Maritsa Solano-González and Karen E. Peterson

Bootstrap approach to validate the performance of models for predicting mortality risk temperature in Portuguese Metropolitan Areas

There has been increasing interest in assessing the impacts of extreme temperatures on mortality due to diseases of the circulatory system. This is further relevant for future climate scenarios where marked ch...

Authors: Mónica Rodrigues, Paula Santana and Alfredo Rocha

Urinary mycoestrogens and age and height at menarche in New Jersey girls

Despite evidence of the endocrine disrupting properties of zearalenone (ZEN) and alpha-zearalanol (zeranol, α-ZAL), they have been minimally studied in human populations. In previous cross-sectional analyses, ...

Authors: Zorimar Rivera-Núñez, Emily S. Barrett, Elizabeth A. Szamreta, Sue A. Shapses, Bo Qin, Yong Lin, Helmut Zarbl, Brian Buckley and Elisa V. Bandera

Bayesian network-based framework for exposure-response study design and interpretation

Conventional environmental-health risk-assessment methods are often limited in their ability to account for uncertainty in contaminant exposure, chemical toxicity and resulting human health risk. Exposure leve...

Authors: Nur H. Orak, Mitchell J. Small and Marek J. Druzdzel

Exposure to prenatal secondhand smoke and early neurodevelopment: Mothers and Children’s Environmental Health (MOCEH) study

The association between exposure to secondhand smoke (SHS) during pregnancy and a child’s neurodevelopment has not been established yet. We explored the association between prenatal exposure to SHS and neurode...

Authors: Myeongjee Lee, Mina Ha, Yun-Chul Hong, Hyesook Park, Yangho Kim, Eui-Jung Kim, Yeni Kim and Eunhee Ha

Letter to the editor regarding “safety of safety evaluation of pesticides: developmental neurotoxicity of chlorpyrifos and chlorpyrifos-methyl” by Mie et al. (environmental health. 2018. 17:77)

Authors: Daland R. Juberg, Alan M. Hoberman, Sue Marty, Catherine A. Picut and Donald G. Stump

Urinary concentrations of phthalate biomarkers and weight change among postmenopausal women: a prospective cohort study

Some phthalates are endocrine disrupting chemicals used as plasticizers in consumer products, and have been associated with obesity in cross-sectional studies, yet prospective evaluations of weight change are ...

Authors: Mary V. Díaz Santana, Susan E. Hankinson, Carol Bigelow, Susan R. Sturgeon, R. Thomas Zoeller, Lesley Tinker, Jo Ann E. Manson, Antonia M. Calafat, Jaymie R. Meliker and Katherine W. Reeves

The Ramazzini Institute 13-week pilot study glyphosate-based herbicides administered at human-equivalent dose to Sprague Dawley rats: effects on development and endocrine system

Glyphosate-based herbicides (GBHs) are broad-spectrum herbicides that act on the shikimate pathway in bacteria, fungi, and plants. The possible effects of GBHs on human health are the subject of an intense pub...

Authors: Fabiana Manservisi, Corina Lesseur, Simona Panzacchi, Daniele Mandrioli, Laura Falcioni, Luciano Bua, Marco Manservigi, Marcella Spinaci, Giovanna Galeati, Alberto Mantovani, Stefano Lorenzetti, Rossella Miglio, Anderson Martino Andrade, David Møbjerg Kristensen, Melissa J. Perry, Shanna H. Swan…

Thyroid cancer risks among medical radiation workers in South Korea, 1996–2015

Thyroid cancer rates, especially among children, are known to be increased by radiation exposure. However, little is known about the impact of chronic low-dose radiation exposure on thyroid cancer risk in adul...

Authors: Won Jin Lee, Dale L. Preston, Eun Shil Cha, Seulki Ko and Hyeyeun Lim

Prenatal arsenic exposure alters the placental expression of multiple epigenetic regulators in a sex-dependent manner

Prenatal exposure to arsenic has been linked to a range of adverse health conditions in later life. Such fetal origins of disease are frequently the result of environmental effects on the epigenome, leading to...

Authors: Emily F. Winterbottom, Yuka Moroishi, Yuliya Halchenko, David A. Armstrong, Paul J. Beach, Quang P. Nguyen, Anthony J. Capobianco, Nagi G. Ayad, Carmen J. Marsit, Zhigang Li, Margaret R. Karagas and David J. Robbins

Polyunsaturated fatty acids and child neurodevelopment among a population exposed to DDT: a cohort study

Child neurodevelopment has been positively linked to maternal intake of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) during pregnancy; however, it is unknown if that relationship persists among populations exposed to e...

Authors: Ángel Mérida-Ortega, Stephen J. Rothenberg, Luisa Torres-Sánchez, Lourdes Schnaas, César Hernández-Alcaraz, Mariano E. Cebrián, Rosa María García-Hernández, Rafael Ogaz-González and Lizbeth López-Carrillo

The CDC blood lead reference value for children: time for a change

The purpose of this article is to consider alternate uses of the blood lead reference value for children. There are two possible approaches. Historically the reference value has been used to guide clinical and...

Authors: Jerome A. Paulson and Mary Jean Brown

A hybrid expert approach for retrospective assessment of occupational exposures in a population-based case-control study of cancer

While the expert-based occupational exposure assessment approach has been considered the reference method for retrospective population-based studies, its implementation in large study samples has become prohib...

Authors: Jean-François Sauvé, Jérôme Lavoué, Louise Nadon, Ramzan Lakhani, Mounia Senhaji Rhazi, Robert Bourbonnais, Hugues Richard and Marie-Élise Parent

Measurement error in a multi-level analysis of air pollution and health: a simulation study

Spatio-temporal models are increasingly being used to predict exposure to ambient outdoor air pollution at high spatial resolution for inclusion in epidemiological analyses of air pollution and health. Measure...

Authors: Barbara K. Butland, Evangelia Samoli, Richard W. Atkinson, Benjamin Barratt and Klea Katsouyanni

Persistent mental and physical health impact of exposure to the September 11, 2001 World Trade Center terrorist attacks

Asthma, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression have each been linked to exposure to the September 11, 2001 World Trade Center (WTC) terrorist attacks (9/11)...

Authors: Hannah T. Jordan, Sukhminder Osahan, Jiehui Li, Cheryl R. Stein, Stephen M. Friedman, Robert M. Brackbill, James E. Cone, Charon Gwynn, Ho Ki Mok and Mark R. Farfel

Tampon use, environmental chemicals and oxidative stress in the BioCycle study

Tampons are used by up to 86% of US women and are a rarely considered potential source of pesticide and metal exposure. Tampons may be of particular concern given the likely higher absorption that occurs in th...

Authors: Jessica Singh, Sunni L. Mumford, Anna Z. Pollack, Enrique F. Schisterman, Marc G. Weisskopf, Ana Navas-Acien and Marianthi-Anna Kioumourtzoglou

Mediating role of arsenic in the relationship between diet and pregnancy outcomes: prospective birth cohort in Bangladesh

Epidemiological evidence suggests that arsenic (As) exposure during pregnancy may reduce infant birth weight. One significant source of As exposure is diet; thus, As may indirectly affect infant growth by medi...

Authors: Pi-I D. Lin, Sabri Bromage, Md. Golam Mostofa, Mohammad Rahman, Joseph Allen, Emily Oken, Molly L. Kile and David C. Christiani

A global perspective on coal-fired power plants and burden of lung cancer

Exposure to ambient particulate matter generated from coal-fired power plants induces long-term health consequences. However, epidemiologic studies have not yet focused on attributing these health burdens spec...

Authors: Cheng-Kuan Lin, Ro-Ting Lin, Tom Chen, Corwin Zigler, Yaguang Wei and David C. Christiani

Development and performance evaluation of a GIS-based metric to assess exposure to airborne pollutant emissions from industrial sources

Dioxins are environmental and persistent organic carcinogens with endocrine disrupting properties. A positive association with several cancers, including risk of breast cancer has been suggested.

Authors: Thomas Coudon, Aurélie Marcelle Nicole Danjou, Elodie Faure, Delphine Praud, Gianluca Severi, Francesca Romana Mancini, Pietro Salizzoni and Béatrice Fervers

Environmental justice and drinking water quality: are there socioeconomic disparities in nitrate levels in U.S. drinking water?

Low-income and minority communities often face disproportionately high pollutant exposures. The lead crisis in Flint, Michigan, has sparked concern about broader socioeconomic disparities in exposures to drink...

Authors: Laurel A. Schaider, Lucien Swetschinski, Christopher Campbell and Ruthann A. Rudel

Trends in neonicotinoid pesticide residues in food and water in the United States, 1999–2015

Neonicotinoids are a class of systemic insecticides widely used on food crops globally. These pesticides may be found in “off-target” food items and persist in the environment. Despite the potential for extens...

Authors: Hillary A. Craddock, Dina Huang, Paul C. Turner, Lesliam Quirós-Alcalá and Devon C. Payne-Sturges

Prenatal exposure to extremely low frequency magnetic field and its impact on fetal growth

Studies on the effect of prenatal exposure to magnetic field (MF) on fetal growth is inconclusive and subject to some methodological limitations, particularly in measurement of MF exposure. The present study a...

Authors: Yanfeng Ren, Jianping Chen, Maohua Miao, De-Kun Li, Hong Liang, Ziliang Wang, Fen Yang, Xiaowei Sun and Wei Yuan

Prenatal exposure to perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances and the risk of hypertensive disorders of pregnancy

Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) have been reported to disrupt endocrine system and reproduction. However, epidemiological evidence on the association between PFAS and preeclampsia is incon...

Authors: Rong Huang, Qian Chen, Lin Zhang, Kai Luo, Lin Chen, Shasha Zhao, Liping Feng and Jun Zhang

Very low-level prenatal mercury exposure and behaviors in children: the HOME Study

Mercury is toxic to the developing brain, but the lowest concentration associated with the development of behavior problems is unclear. The purpose of this study was to examine the association between very low...

Authors: Nimesh B. Patel, Yingying Xu, Lawrence C. McCandless, Aimin Chen, Kimberly Yolton, Joseph Braun, Robert L. Jones, Kim N. Dietrich and Bruce P. Lanphear

The evidence of human exposure to glyphosate: a review

Despite the growing and widespread use of glyphosate, a broad-spectrum herbicide and desiccant, very few studies have evaluated the extent and amount of human exposure.

Authors: Christina Gillezeau, Maaike van Gerwen, Rachel M. Shaffer, Iemaan Rana, Luoping Zhang, Lianne Sheppard and Emanuela Taioli

Air pollution in the week prior to delivery and preterm birth in 24 Canadian cities: a time to event analysis

Numerous studies have examined the association between air pollution and preterm birth (< 37 weeks gestation) but findings have been inconsistent. These associations may be more difficult to detect than associ...

Authors: David M. Stieb, Eric Lavigne, Li Chen, Lauren Pinault, Antonio Gasparrini and Michael Tjepkema

Mortality among workers exposed to asbestos at the shipyard of Genoa, Italy: a 55 years follow-up

Exposure to asbestos remains a global issue due to its massive use in the twentieth century and its long environmental persistence. Exposure to asbestos still occurs during dismantling of ships and vessels, bu...

Authors: Domenico Franco Merlo, Marco Bruzzone, Paolo Bruzzi, Elsa Garrone, Riccardo Puntoni, Lucia Maiorana and Marcello Ceppi

Non-uniform radiation-induced biological responses at the tissue level involved in the health risk of environmental radiation: a radiobiological hypothesis

The conventional concept of radiation protection is based on epidemiological studies of radiation that support a positive correlation between dose and response. However, there is a remarkable difference in bio...

Authors: Hisanori Fukunaga and Kevin M. Prise

The global environmental injustice of fast fashion

Fast fashion, inexpensive and widely available of-the-moment garments, has changed the way people buy and dispose of clothing. By selling large quantities of clothing at cheap prices, fast fashion has emerged ...

Authors: Rachel Bick, Erika Halsey and Christine C. Ekenga

Maternal urinary 2-hydroxynaphthalene and birth outcomes in Taiyuan, China

Naphthalene is the simplest polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH). It is easily emitted into the atmosphere, posing a significant risk to human health. However, limited studies have described the impact of nap...

Authors: Jisheng Nie, Jinyu Li, Lin Cheng, Yanning Li, Yunjun Deng, Zhiwei Yan, Lei Duan, Qiao Niu, Frederica Perera and Deliang Tang

Association between mesothelioma and non-occupational asbestos exposure: systematic review and meta-analysis

The risk of mesothelioma has been shown to be associated with exposure to asbestos fibers. Most of the existing literature focuses on occupational exposure; however, non-occupational asbestos exposure has also...

Authors: Rengyi Xu, Frances K. Barg, Edward A. Emmett, Douglas J. Wiebe and Wei-Ting Hwang

Epidemiological association between multiple chemical sensitivity and birth by caesarean section: a nationwide case-control study

Multiple chemical sensitivity (MCS) is characterized by recurrent nonspecific symptoms that are attributed to exposure to trace levels of environmental agents. Although the clinical symptoms of MCS have been d...

Authors: Kentaro Watai, Yuma Fukutomi, Hiroaki Hayashi, Yosuke Kamide, Kiyoshi Sekiya and Masami Taniguchi