Program/Event
Arts and Research Showcase 2024
Abstract
Abstract
Humans and animals, especially in an urban environment, are constantly ingesting air pollution. Since the industrial lifestyle is preferred or simply mandatory for many, the exact impacts of concentrated air pollution ingestion, especially on the cardiovascular system, needs to be unambiguous. It has already been seen that high levels of exposure to air pollution are correlated with increased rates of anemia in humans (Honda et al., 2017), (Morales-Ancajima et al., 2019), (Elbarbary et al., 2020), (Mehta et al., 2021). Further data indicates that air pollution ingestion may even directly cause some detrimental pro-inflammatory and oxidant-inducing effects on the cardiovascular system which may lead to anemia (Hwang & Kim, 2024). The long-term effects of vascular stress, like anemia, can be life-threatening. Anemia can increase the risk for lethal problems like arrhythmia, enlarged heart and heart failure (Mayo Clinic Staff, 2023). In this study, we analyzed how two specific key measures of air pollution, NO2 concentration and Ultrafine Particulates (UFP) concentration, correlated with vascular stress in a common bird species, American Robins. The UFP data and NO2 data was found using passive air samplers in the study area as part of the Green Heart Louisville study. Vascular stress was quantified using an observed ratio of immature:mature red blood cells. This ratio is indicative of the rate at which new blood cells were formed and is an indicator of anemia, a form of vascular stress (Malvat et al., 2020). These ratios were obtained from blood smears made from adult American Robins captured in mist nets, May-June 2022. Pictures of the blood smears were taken using the MosaicV2.3 software, and the FIJI (is just ImageJ) software was used to manually count the ratio of immature:mature red blood cells. We predicted that NO2 concentration and UFP’s concentration each would have a significant impact on the immature:mature red blood cells ratio. This would indicate that increased air pollution resulted in increased vascular stress.
Works Cited
Elbarbary, M., Honda, T., Morgan, G., Guo, Y., Guo, Y., Kowal, P., & Negin, J. (2020). Ambient Air Pollution Exposure Association with Anaemia Prevalence and Haemoglobin Levels in Chinese Older Adults. International journal of environmental research and public health, 17(9), 3209. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17093209
Honda, T., Pun, V. C., Manjourides, J., & Suh, H. (2017, April). Anemia prevalence and hemoglobin levels are associated with long-term exposure to air pollution in an older population. Environment international. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5361751/
Hwang, J., & Kim, H.-J. (2024, April 9). Association of ambient air pollution with hemoglobin levels and anemia in the general population of Korean adults. BMC public health. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11003135/
Malvat, Z., Lynch, S. A., Bennison, A., & Jessopp, M. (2020, May 13). Evidence of links between haematological condition and foraging behaviour in northern gannets (morus bassanus). Royal Society open science. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7277282/
Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research. (2023, May 11). Anemia. Mayo Clinic. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/anemia/symptoms-causes/syc-20351360
Mehta, U., Kurpad, A., Hart, J., Ghosh, S., Chowdhury, S., & Dey, S. (2021, January 7). The association between ambient PM2.5 exposure and anemia... : Environmental epidemiology. LWW. https://journals.lww.com/environepidem/fulltext/2021/02000/the_association_between_ambient_pm2_5_exposure_and.3.aspx
Morales-Ancajima, V. C., Tapia, V., Vu, B. N., Liu, Y., Alarcón-Yaquetto, D. E., & Gonzales, G. F. (2019, July 24). Increased outdoor PM2.5 concentration is associated with moderate/severe anemia in children aged 6–59 months in Lima, Peru. Journal of Environmental and Public Health. https://www.hindawi.com/journals/jeph/2019/6127845/
Recommended Citation
Stine, Lauren A. and Abolins-Abols, Mikus
(2024)
"The impact of air pollution on the cardiovascular system in American Robins: NO2 levels' and Ultrafine Particulate levels' correlation to the ratio of immature to mature erythrocytes,"
The Cardinal Edge: Vol. 2:
Iss.
2, Article 41.
Available at:
https://ir.library.louisville.edu/tce/vol2/iss2/41
