TITLE:
Prenatal Exposure to Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Birth Weight in China
AUTHORS:
Qiong Chen, Tongzhang Zheng, Bryan A. Bassig, Yibin Cheng, Brian Leaderer, Shaobin Lin, Theodore Holford, Jie Qiu, Yawei Zhang, Kunchong Shi, Yong Zhu, Jianjun Niu, Yonghong Li, Huan Guo, Xiaobin Hu, Yinlong Jin
KEYWORDS:
Maternal Exposure, Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon, Birth Weight, Fetal Development, Maternal Serum
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Air Pollution,
Vol.3 No.4,
December
2,
2014
ABSTRACT: Adverse birth
outcomes are a leading cause of mortality in children in China, but the
environmental influences of these conditions remain largely unexplained in this
population. We aimed to evaluate the levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons
(PAHs) in Chinese pregnant women and their newborns, and to examine the
association between levels of PAHs and infant birth weight. We conducted a
cross-sectional study including 81 pairs of mothers and newborns from four
hospitals in four different cities in China. High Performance Liquid
Chromatography was used to measure the concentration of nine PAHs in maternal
and cord blood and multiple linear regression analyses were used to evaluate
the associations of these PAHs with infant birth weight. Anthracene (ANT)
had the highest average concentration and detection rate (geometric mean = 69.54
ng/g and 76.5%, respectively) in maternal serum samples, while fluoranthene
(FLT) had the highest concentration and detection rate (geometric mean = 68.4
ng/g and 50.6%, respectively) in the cord blood. Most of the measured PAHs in
maternal serum and three PAHs in cord blood were inversely but
non-significantly associated with birth weight. The strongest associations were
observed for higher concentrations of benzo (a) pyrene (BaP) in maternal serum
(230.7 g decrease for levels > median vs.