Environmental research
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Environmental research · Oct 2017
Prenatal particulate air pollution exposure and body composition in urban preschool children: Examining sensitive windows and sex-specific associations.
Evolving animal studies and limited epidemiological data show that prenatal air pollution exposure is associated with childhood obesity. Timing of exposure and child sex may play an important role in these associations. We applied an innovative method to examine sex-specific sensitive prenatal windows of exposure to PM2.5 on anthropometric measures in preschool-aged children. ⋯ Increased prenatal PM2.5 exposure was more strongly associated with indices of increased whole body size in boys and with an indicator of body shape in girls. Methods to better characterize vulnerable windows may provide insight into underlying mechanisms contributing to sex-specific associations.
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Environmental research · Oct 2017
The association between the incidence of postmenopausal breast cancer and concentrations at street-level of nitrogen dioxide and ultrafine particles.
There is scant information as to whether traffic-related air pollution is associated with the incidence of breast cancer. Nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and ultrafine particles (UFPs, <0.1µm), are two pollutants that capture intra-urban variations in traffic-related air pollution and may also be associated with incidence. ⋯ Our findings suggest that exposure to ambient NO2 and UFPs may increase the risk of incident postmenopausal breast cancer especially amongst cases with positive oestrogen and progesterone receptor status.