Exposure to Air Pollution and the Nasal Microbiome in Children
Year: 2022
Type: conference-abstract
Abstract: BACKGROUND AND AIM: Pollution induced damage to the respiratory epithelium may shift its resident microbial community. We examined associations of air pollution with the nasal microbiome in children. METHODS: We collected nasal microbiome samples in early adolescence (mean age 12.9 years) from the anterior nares of 286 participants in Project Viva, a pre-birth cohort. Participants were white (66%), Black (15%), Hispanic (4%), Asian (3%) and more than one race/ethnicity (12%). We considered three PM2.5 exposure windows (mean ± SD, µg/m3) prior to nasal sampling (1 day (7.4± 3.0), 1 week (7.4± 2.0), 1 month (7.3± 1.5)). We sequenced the bacterial microbiome by 16S (V1-V3) and summarized OTUs by genus. We modeled both abundance of individual taxa (log-transformed) and PAM derived cluster states (Jensen-Shannon Distance) as outcomes, using MaAsLin2 linear models and multinomial regression, respectively. We adjusted models for age, race/ethnicity, sex, BMI, maternal education, sine and cosine of season, and household smoking. Effect estimates are for a 1-unit PM2.5 increase. RESULTS: Past week PM2.5 exposure was nominally associated with increased Propionibacterium (Beta=0.02, p=0.046). Past month PM2.5 was associated with increased Neisseriaceae (unclassified genera) (Beta=0.018, p=0.006) and Porphyromonas (Beta=0.002, p=0.02). Six cluster states were identified in participants (Propionibacterium dominant (N=26%), Neisseriaceae dominant (N=10%), Staphylococcus dominant (N=18%), Streptococcus dominant (N=13%), Corynebacterium dominant (N=28%), and Moraxella dominant (N=5%)). For past month PM2.5, odds of Neisseriaceae cluster membership were increased (OR=1.53, 95% CI 1.19 to 1.99), while odds of Moraxella cluster membership were decreased (OR=0.68, 95% CI 0.58 to 0.78) as compared to the Corynebacterium cluster. Prior day PM2.5 was not associated with the microbiome. CONCLUSIONS: Short term PM2.5 exposure may alter nasal microbiome community cluster states in children. The potential health implications of air pollution associated changes in the host microbiome have yet to be explored but represent a new avenue for research.
Source: ISEE Conference Abstracts
Language: English
Subfield: Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4316924806