Diesel Exposure in Mines: Biomarkers in Urine and Realtime Air Monitoring

描述(由申请人提供)：接触柴油废气(DE)的增加是普遍存在的，并与不良健康后果有关，包括呼吸道刺激、心血管疾病、免疫功能障碍和肺癌。IARC最近将DE归类为对人类致癌(第1组)；基于充分的证据，暴露与肺癌风险增加有关。然而，DE暴露指标的特异性和可靠性方面的局限性阻碍了对DE暴露与不良健康后果之间联系的定量评估。因此，提高我们可靠地评估个人接触DE的能力的研究对于了解DE暴露与疾病之间的关系以及支持制定充分保护工人健康的基于科学的暴露标准是至关重要的。在所有职业中，地下矿工接触DE的风险最高。因此，矿工遭受与DE接触有关的不良健康影响的风险很高。目前项目的总体目标是评价评估地下矿工接触DE的新方法。其具体目标是：(1)确定MSHA批准的DPM冲击器与颗粒物质量浓度、颗粒物数浓度和CO的实时测量之间的关联；(2)确定新设计的个人和固定位置无线遥控器网络的可靠性，以提供DE暴露的替代物的实时测量，包括颗粒物数浓度；以及(3)确定DE特有的化学物质1-硝基并(1-NP)的尿代谢物是否是工人接触DE的可靠指标。我们建议的研究针对的是采矿业，以及NIOSH在暴露评估和呼吸道疾病方面的跨部门计划。该项目的成果是新的暴露监测方法(尿液生物标记物、DE的实时测量、暴露监测的无线传感器阵列)，这些方法将改进对矿工暴露于DE的估计--成本可能比MSHA批准的DPM冲击器技术低得多。改进的接触评估方法反过来将有助于评估与这些接触有关的疾病负担，以及最近减少矿工接触DE的干预措施的有效性(例如，引入生物柴油和发动机排放控制装置)(项目成果)。从研究到实践：这些研究将评估可靠性， 在真实世界条件下，新的暴露监测工具在现场的准确性和易用性。关于矿井中DE浓度的收集数据将与矿山工业卫生员共享，并可用于确定DE暴露可能接近危险水平的任何位置或活动，并在必要时采取纠正行动。此外，通过这种数据共享，矿山操作员将熟悉我们在这项研究中评估的新型暴露监测工具。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Elevated exposure to diesel exhaust (DE) is widespread and has been linked to adverse health outcomes including respiratory irritation, cardiovascular disease, immune dysfunction and lung cancer. IARC recently classified DE as carcinogenic to humans (Group 1); based on sufficient evidence that exposure is associated with an increased risk for lung cancer. However, limitations in the specificity and reliability of metrics of DE exposure hamper quantitative evaluation of links between DE exposure and adverse health outcomes. Therefore, studies which improve our ability to reliably assess personal exposure to DE are critically required to understand the relationship between DE exposures and disease, and to support the setting of science-based exposure standards that adequately protect the health of workers. Underground miners experience amongst the highest exposures to DE of any occupation. Thus, miners are at high risk for suffering adverse health effects associated with DE exposure. The overall goal of the current project is to evaluate novel approaches for assessing the exposure of underground miners to DE. The specific aims are: (1) Determine the association between the MSHA-approved DPM impactor and real-time measurements of particle mass concentration, particle number concentration and CO; (2) Determine the reliability of a newly designed network of personal and fixed-location wireless remote sensors to provide real-time measurements of surrogates for DE exposure including particle number concentration; and (3) Determine whether urinary metabolites of the DE- specific chemical 1-nitropyrene (1-NP) are a reliable measure of individual workers exposure to DE. Our proposed research addresses the mining sector, and NIOSH's cross-sector programs in exposure assessment and respiratory diseases. The outputs from this project are new exposure monitoring approaches (urinary biomarkers, real-time measures of DE, wireless sensor arrays for exposure monitoring) that will provide improved estimation of miner's exposure to DE- likely at significantly lower cost than the MSHA-approved DPM impactor technology. The improved exposure assessment methods will in turn facilitate evaluation of the burden of disease associated with these exposures, and the effectiveness of recent interventions to reduce miner's exposures to DE (e.g. introduction of biodiesel and engine emission control devices) (the project outcomes). Research to practice: These studies will evaluate the reliability, accuracy and ease of use of the novel exposure monitoring tools in the field under real-world conditions. Data collected regarding DE concentrations in the mine will be shared with the mine industrial hygienist, and can be used to identify any locations or activities where DE exposures may approach hazardous levels, and take corrective action where necessary. Furthermore, through this sharing of data, the mine operators will become familiar with the novel exposure monitoring tools that we are evaluating in this research.