Assessing the role of particulate matter size and composition on gene expression in pulmonary cells

Identifying the mechanisms by which air pollution causes human health effects is a daunting task. Airsheds around the world are composed of pollution mixtures made up of hundreds of chemical and biological components with an extensive array of physicochemical properties. Current in vivo approaches are limited to the identification of associations between pollutants and health but do not allow for the identification of precise biological mechanisms of effect or the component(s) responsible for the effect. High-throughput in vitro methods using relevant cell culture systems and microarray technology allow researchers to evaluate the mechanisms by which air pollutants affect human health. Our studies have used human airway epithelial cells primarily to test the toxicological effects of particles of different sizes and of various particle components from several cities across the United States. Chemical mass balance analysis is also being used to analyze these samples to establish links between physicochemical properties of particulate matter (PM) and potential sources. The ultimate goal of this line of research is to link the mechanistic data to the PM source data in order to gain an understanding about how the components and sources of PM affect human health.