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Pollution May Age the Brain
Nicholas Bakalar
June 22, 2015
Exposure to air pollution may hasten brain aging, a new study has found. Researchers studied 1,403 women without dementia who were initially enrolled in a large health study from 1996 to 1998. They measured their brain volume with M.R.I. (magnetic resonance imaging) scans in 2005 and 2006, when the women were 71 to 89 years old.
Using residential histories and air pollution data, they estimated their exposure to air pollution from 1999 to 2006. They used data recorded at monitoring sites on exposure to PM 2.5 – tiny particulate matter that easily penetrates the lungs.
Each increase of 3.49 micrograms per cubic centimeter cumulative exposure to pollutants was associated with a 6.23 cubic centimeter decrease in white matter, the equivalent of one to two years of brain aging. The association remained after adjusting for many variables, including age, smoking, physical activity, blood pressure, body mass index, education and income.
Previous studies have shown that air pollution can cause inflammation and damage to the vascular system, but this study, in The Annals of Neurology, showed damage to the brain itself. “This tells us that the damage air pollution can impart goes beyond the circulatory system,” said the lead author, Dr. Jiu-Chiuan Chen, an associate professor of preventive medicine at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California. “Particles in the ambient air are an environmental neurotoxin to the aging brain.”
(http://well.blogs.nytimes.com. Adaptado.)
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