Policy and Regulatory Action Can Reduce Harms From Particulate Pollution

Bhatia, Rajiv

doi:10.1001/archinternmed.2011.799

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 12 publications

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“…Yet concern has been growing about the diverse negative health effects of air pollution, raising the possibility that air quality may play an important role in mental health and cognitive function. While the study of air pollution and health was originally driven by dramatic events and drastic outcomes such as mortality during 1930 Meuse Valley fog [24] due to the combination of industrial air pollution and climatic conditions, and the 1952 Great London Fog event [25–27], in which a multiple day temperature inversion concentrated coal-based air pollutants and resulted in thousands of deaths, attention has been turning to the question of chronic exposures and chronic diseases, including neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative conditions [28, 29]. More recent events, such as the Eastern China smog in 2013 [30] and the New Delhi smog in 2017 [31] saw air pollution measurements reach record levels, conditions that led to significant increases in morbidity and mortality rates.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental pollution is associated with increased risk of psychiatric disorders in the US and Denmark

et al. 2019

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The search for the genetic factors underlying complex neuropsychiatric disorders has proceeded apace in the past decade. Despite some advances in identifying genetic variants associated with psychiatric disorders, most variants have small individual contributions to risk. By contrast, disease risk increase appears to be less subtle for disease-predisposing environmental insults. In this study, we sought to identify associations between environmental pollution and risk of neuropsychiatric disorders. We present exploratory analyses of 2 independent, very large datasets: 151 million unique individuals, represented in a United States insurance claims dataset, and 1.4 million unique individuals documented in Danish national treatment registers. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) county-level environmental quality indices (EQIs) in the US and individual-level exposure to air pollution in Denmark were used to assess the association between pollution exposure and the risk of neuropsychiatric disorders. These results show that air pollution is significantly associated with increased risk of psychiatric disorders. We hypothesize that pollutants affect the human brain via neuroinflammatory pathways that have also been shown to cause depression-like phenotypes in animal studies.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental pollution is associated with increased risk of psychiatric disorders in the US and Denmark

et al. 2019

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How Does it STAC Up? Revisiting the Scaffolding Theory of Aging and Cognition

2014

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“The Scaffolding Theory of Aging and Cognition (STAC)”, proposed in 2009, is a conceptual model of cognitive aging that integrated evidence from structural and functional neuroimaging to explain how the combined effects of adverse and compensatory neural processes produce varying levels of cognitive function. The model made clear and testable predictions about how different brain variables, both structural and functional, were related to cognitive function, focusing on the core construct of compensatory scaffolding. The present paper provides a revised model that integrates new evidence about the aging brain that has emerged since STAC was published 5 years ago. Unlike the original STAC model, STAC-r incorporates life-course factors that serve to enhance or deplete neural resources, thereby influencing the developmental course of brain structure and function, as well as cognition, over time. Life-course factors also influence compensatory processes that are engaged to meet cognitive challenge, and to ameliorate the adverse effects of structural and functional decline. The revised model is discussed in relation to recent lifespan and longitudinal data as well as emerging evidence about the effects of training interventions. STAC-r goes beyond the previous model by combining a life-span approach with a life-course approach to understand and predict cognitive status and rate of cognitive change over time.

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