Blood-borne biomarkers and bioindicators for linking exposure to health effects in environmental health science

Abstract

Environmental health science aims to link environmental pollution sources to adverse health outcomes to develop effective exposure intervention strategies that reduce long-term disease risks. Over the past few decades, the public health community recognized that health risk is driven by interaction between the human genome and external environment. Now that the human genetic code has been sequenced, establishing this "G × E" (gene-environment) interaction requires a similar effort to decode the human exposome, which is the accumulation of an individual's environmental exposures and metabolic responses throughout the person's lifetime. The exposome is composed of endogenous and exogenous chemicals, many of which are measurable as biomarkers in blood, breath, and urine. Exposure to pollutants is assessed by analyzing biofluids for the pollutant itself or its metabolic products. New methods are being developed to use a subset of biomarkers, termed bioindicators, to demonstrate biological changes indicative of future adverse health effects. Typically, environmental biomarkers are assessed using noninvasive (excreted) media, such as breath and urine. Blood is often avoided for biomonitoring due to practical reasons such as medical personnel, infectious waste, or clinical setting, despite the fact that blood represents the central compartment that interacts with every living cell and is the most relevant biofluid for certain applications and analyses. The aims of this study were to (1) review the current use of blood samples in environmental health research, (2) briefly contrast blood with other biological media, and (3) propose additional applications for blood analysis in human exposure research.

Therapeutic significance of β-glucuronidase activity and its inhibitors: A review

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Biomarkers of mercury toxicity: Past, present, and future trends

“…Biomarkers have been defined as measures in cellular or biochemical components or processes, structures or functions (including neurobehavioral) that can be measured in a biological system (Gil and Pla, 2001; Kendall et al, 2001; Paustenbach, 2001; Silbergeld and Davis, 1994; Tan et al, 2012; Wallace et al, 2016). These alterations may occur at any stage along the causal pathway, which varies from minimal molecular changes resulting from exposure to the toxic compound until establishment of overt toxicity, when evident end-points of toxicity become apparent from a clinical perspective (Figure 1A) (Bendford et al, 2000; Wallace et al, 2016). Ideally, biomarkers should be non-invasive, sensitive and specific for the xenobiotic that is being assessed (Bernard, 2008; Grandjean et al, 1994; Paustenbach, 2001; Tan et al, 2012).…”

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