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Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant

Background: Although urban air pollution is a complex mix containing multiple constituents, studies of the health effects of long-term exposure often focus on a single pollutant as a proxy for the entire mixture. A better understanding of the component pollutant concentrations and interrelationships...

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Autores principales: Levy, Ilan, Mihele, Cristian, Lu, Gang, Narayan, Julie, Brook, Jeffrey R.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3888565/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24225648
http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1306518
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author Levy, Ilan
Mihele, Cristian
Lu, Gang
Narayan, Julie
Brook, Jeffrey R.
author_facet Levy, Ilan
Mihele, Cristian
Lu, Gang
Narayan, Julie
Brook, Jeffrey R.
author_sort Levy, Ilan
collection PubMed
description Background: Although urban air pollution is a complex mix containing multiple constituents, studies of the health effects of long-term exposure often focus on a single pollutant as a proxy for the entire mixture. A better understanding of the component pollutant concentrations and interrelationships would be useful in epidemiological studies that exploit spatial differences in exposure by clarifying the extent to which measures of individual pollutants, particularly nitrogen dioxide (NO(2)), represent spatial patterns in the multipollutant mixture. Objectives: We examined air pollutant concentrations and interrelationships at the intraurban scale to obtain insight into the nature of the urban mixture of air pollutants. Methods: Mobile measurements of 23 air pollutants were taken systematically at high resolution in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, over 34 days in the winter, summer, and autumn of 2009. Results: We observed variability in pollution levels and in the statistical correlations between different pollutants according to season and neighborhood. Nitrogen oxide species (nitric oxide, NO(2), nitrogen oxides, and total oxidized nitrogen species) had the highest overall spatial correlations with the suite of pollutants measured. Ultrafine particles and hydrocarbon-like organic aerosol concentration, a derived measure used as a specific indicator of traffic particles, also had very high correlations. Conclusions: Our findings indicate that the multipollutant mix varies considerably throughout the city, both in time and in space, and thus, no single pollutant would be a perfect proxy measure for the entire mix under all circumstances. However, based on overall average spatial correlations with the suite of pollutants measured, nitrogen oxide species appeared to be the best available indicators of spatial variation in exposure to the outdoor urban air pollutant mixture. Citation: Levy I, Mihele C, Lu G, Narayan J, Brook JR. 2014. Evaluating multipollutant exposure and urban air quality: pollutant interrelationships, neighborhood variability, and nitrogen dioxide as a proxy pollutant. Environ Health Perspect 122:65–72; http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1306518
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spelling pubmed-38885652014-01-21 Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant Levy, Ilan Mihele, Cristian Lu, Gang Narayan, Julie Brook, Jeffrey R. Environ Health Perspect Research Background: Although urban air pollution is a complex mix containing multiple constituents, studies of the health effects of long-term exposure often focus on a single pollutant as a proxy for the entire mixture. A better understanding of the component pollutant concentrations and interrelationships would be useful in epidemiological studies that exploit spatial differences in exposure by clarifying the extent to which measures of individual pollutants, particularly nitrogen dioxide (NO(2)), represent spatial patterns in the multipollutant mixture. Objectives: We examined air pollutant concentrations and interrelationships at the intraurban scale to obtain insight into the nature of the urban mixture of air pollutants. Methods: Mobile measurements of 23 air pollutants were taken systematically at high resolution in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, over 34 days in the winter, summer, and autumn of 2009. Results: We observed variability in pollution levels and in the statistical correlations between different pollutants according to season and neighborhood. Nitrogen oxide species (nitric oxide, NO(2), nitrogen oxides, and total oxidized nitrogen species) had the highest overall spatial correlations with the suite of pollutants measured. Ultrafine particles and hydrocarbon-like organic aerosol concentration, a derived measure used as a specific indicator of traffic particles, also had very high correlations. Conclusions: Our findings indicate that the multipollutant mix varies considerably throughout the city, both in time and in space, and thus, no single pollutant would be a perfect proxy measure for the entire mix under all circumstances. However, based on overall average spatial correlations with the suite of pollutants measured, nitrogen oxide species appeared to be the best available indicators of spatial variation in exposure to the outdoor urban air pollutant mixture. Citation: Levy I, Mihele C, Lu G, Narayan J, Brook JR. 2014. Evaluating multipollutant exposure and urban air quality: pollutant interrelationships, neighborhood variability, and nitrogen dioxide as a proxy pollutant. Environ Health Perspect 122:65–72; http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1306518 National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences 2013-11-13 2014-01-01 /pmc/articles/PMC3888565/ /pubmed/24225648 http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1306518 Text en http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/ Publication of EHP lies in the public domain and is therefore without copyright. All text from EHP may be reprinted freely. Use of materials published in EHP should be acknowledged (for example, “Reproduced with permission from Environmental Health Perspectives”); pertinent reference information should be provided for the article from which the material was reproduced. Articles from EHP, especially the News section, may contain photographs or illustrations copyrighted by other commercial organizations or individuals that may not be used without obtaining prior approval from the holder of the copyright.
spellingShingle Research
Levy, Ilan
Mihele, Cristian
Lu, Gang
Narayan, Julie
Brook, Jeffrey R.
Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant
title Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant
title_full Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant
title_fullStr Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant
title_full_unstemmed Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant
title_short Evaluating Multipollutant Exposure and Urban Air Quality: Pollutant Interrelationships, Neighborhood Variability, and Nitrogen Dioxide as a Proxy Pollutant
title_sort evaluating multipollutant exposure and urban air quality: pollutant interrelationships, neighborhood variability, and nitrogen dioxide as a proxy pollutant
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3888565/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24225648
http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1306518
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