Investigating the relationship between non-occupational pesticide exposure and metabolomic biomarkers

Front Public Health. 2023 Oct 11:11:1248609. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2023.1248609. eCollection 2023.

Abstract

The relationship between pesticide exposures and metabolomics biomarkers is not well understood. We examined the changes in the serum metabolome (early biomarkers) and the metabolic pathways associated with various pesticide exposure scenarios (OPE: overall exposure, PEM: exposure in months, PEY: exposure in years, and PEU: reported specific pesticides use) using data from the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 31-year cross-sectional examination. We utilized questionnaire data on pesticide exposures and serum samples for nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)-based metabolomics analyses. For exposures and metabolites associations, participants size varied between 2,361 and 5,035. To investigate associations between metabolomics biomarkers and exposure to pesticide scenarios compared to those who reported no exposures multivariable regression analyses stratified by sex and adjustment with covariates (season of pesticide use, socioeconomic position (SEP), alcohol consumption, BMI, and latitude of residence) were performed. Multiple testing by Benjamini-Hochberg false discovery rate (FDR) correction applied. Pesticide exposures differed by sex, season of pesticide use, alcohol, SEP, latitude of residence. Our results showed that all pesticide exposure scenarios were negatively associated with decreased HDL concentrations across all lipoprotein subclasses in women. OPE, PEY, and PEU were associated with decreased branched-chain amino acid concentrations in men and decreased albumin concentrations in women. OPE, PEY and PEU were also associated with changes in glycolysis metabolites and ketone bodies in both sexes. Specific pesticides exposure was negatively associated with sphingolipids and inflammatory biomarkers in men. In women, OPE, PEM, and PEU were associated with decreased apolipoprotein A1 and increased apolipoprotein B/apolipoprotein A1 ratio. Our findings suggest that identification of early biomarkers of disease risk related to pesticide exposures can inform strategies to reduce exposure and investigate causal pathways. Women may be more susceptible to non-occupational pesticide exposures when compared to men, and future sex-specific studies are warranted.

Keywords: Finland; general population; metabolomics; non-communicable diseases; non-occupational exposure; pesticides.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Apolipoprotein A-I
  • Biomarkers
  • Cross-Sectional Studies
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Metabolomics
  • Pesticides*

Substances

  • Pesticides
  • Apolipoprotein A-I
  • Biomarkers

Grants and funding

The project EDCMET has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 825762. Other Funding sources: Academy of Finland [grant nos. 24300796, 24302031, and 285547 (EGEA-project)]; the Medical Research Council (MRC) UK (grant no. G0601653); Medical Research Council Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council PREcisE [Nutrition & Epigenome, The Joint Programming Initiative a Healthy Diet for a Healthy Life (JPI HDHL, MR/S03658X/1)] and Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation. NFBC1966 (31-y) received core funding for data generation and curation from University of Oulu (grant nos. 65354 and 24000692); Oulu University Hospital (grant nos. 2/97, 8/97, and 24301140); Ministry of Health and Social Affairs (grant nos. 23/251/97, 160/97, and 190/97); National Institute for Health and Welfare, Helsinki (grant no. 54121); Regional Institute of Occupational Health, Oulu, Finland (grant nos. 50621 and 54231); and ERDF European Regional Development Fund (grant no. 539/2010 A31592). The funding sources had no influence on the study design, collection, analysis, interpretation of data, writing of the report, or on the decision to submit the article.