Associations of road traffic noise with adipose tissue depots and hepatic fat content – Results from the German National Cohort (NAKO)

Little is known about the relation between traffic noise exposure, an established environmental risk factor for cardiovascular disease, and early obesity-related risk markers such as adipose tissue (AT) and hepatic fat. Therefore, we aimed to assess associations of long-term road traffic noise exposure with AT depots measures from whole-body magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). We analyzed cross-sectional data from 11,343 participants from the population-based German National Cohort (NAKO) who underwent MRI examination between 2014 and 2016, considering visceral (VAT), subcutaneous abdominal (SCAAT), subcutaneous thoracic AT (SCTAT) and hepatic fat content as outcomes. Annual road traffic noise (L<sub>den</sub>) data from the year 2017 (source: central EIONET data repository) was used to calculate weighted mean noise levels on a continuous scale within 10 and 100-meter buffers of participants' residencies. Among 11,101 participants with complete outcome data, 48.7 % were women, and the mean age was 51.9 years. Higher annual L<sub>den</sub> was associated with increased AT depots and hepatic fat content in men (e.g., VAT: 1.72 %-change [95 % confidence interval: [0.14 %; 3.30 %]; SCAAT: 2.18 %-change [0.43 %; 3.93 %], hepatic fat content: 3.57 %-change [1.41 %; 5.78 %] per 10 dB(A) increase in L<sub>den</sub> (10 m)) and women (e.g., VAT: 3.13 %-change [1.09 %; 5.18 %]; SCAAT: 2.38 %-change [0.55 %; 4.20 %], hepatic fat content: 3.08 %-change [1.00 %; 5.21 %] per 10 dB(A) increase in L<sub>den</sub> (10 m)). Associations were robust with all outcomes after adjusting for air pollutants and surrounding greenness, and effect modification by obesity and hypertension was observed for SCAAT, SCTAT and hepatic fat content. Our findings indicate that annual exposure to road traffic noise is associated with increased adipose tissue depots and hepatic fat content, and thus present novel evidence for the cross-sectional association between noise and early MRI-derived metabolic health markers.

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Publication Details

Journal
Environment International
Published
2025-05-28
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2025.109566
Citations
2
Primary Topic
Noise Effects and Management
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
6.24

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article

Associations of road traffic noise with adipose tissue depots and hepatic fat content – Results from the German National Cohort (NAKO)

Karin Halina Greiser, Barbara Hoffmann, Henry Völzke, Susanne Rospleszcz et al.
2 citations
Environment International
Noise Effects and Management
6.24
article

Associations of road traffic noise with adipose tissue depots and hepatic fat content – Results from the German National Cohort (NAKO)

Karin Halina Greiser, Barbara Hoffmann, Henry Völzke, Susanne Rospleszcz, Jürgen Machann, Claudia Meinke‐Franze, Tobias Haueise, Kathrin Wolf, Rajini Nagrani, Clara Matthiessen, Viktoria Palm, Sophia Stoecklein, Fabian Bamberg, Norbert Hosten, Beate Endemann, Marco Dallavalle, Fiona Niedermayer, Tobias Pischon, Tobias Nonnenmacher, Jeanette Schulz‐Menger, Bettina Katalin Budai, Verena Katzke, Thoralf Niendorf, Alexandra Schneider, Tobias Norajitra, Annette Peters, Christopher L. Schlett, Jochen Hirsch, Matthias Günther, Johanna Nattenmüller
article en
2 citations

Abstract

Little is known about the relation between traffic noise exposure, an established environmental risk factor for cardiovascular disease, and early obesity-related risk markers such as adipose tissue (AT) and hepatic fat. Therefore, we aimed to assess associations of long-term road traffic noise exposure with AT depots measures from whole-body magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). We analyzed cross-sectional data from 11,343 participants from the population-based German National Cohort (NAKO) who underwent MRI examination between 2014 and 2016, considering visceral (VAT), subcutaneous abdominal (SCAAT), subcutaneous thoracic AT (SCTAT) and hepatic fat content as outcomes. Annual road traffic noise (L<sub>den</sub>) data from the year 2017 (source: central EIONET data repository) was used to calculate weighted mean noise levels on a continuous scale within 10 and 100-meter buffers of participants' residencies. Among 11,101 participants with complete outcome data, 48.7 % were women, and the mean age was 51.9 years. Higher annual L<sub>den</sub> was associated with increased AT depots and hepatic fat content in men (e.g., VAT: 1.72 %-change [95 % confidence interval: [0.14 %; 3.30 %]; SCAAT: 2.18 %-change [0.43 %; 3.93 %], hepatic fat content: 3.57 %-change [1.41 %; 5.78 %] per 10 dB(A) increase in L<sub>den</sub> (10 m)) and women (e.g., VAT: 3.13 %-change [1.09 %; 5.18 %]; SCAAT: 2.38 %-change [0.55 %; 4.20 %], hepatic fat content: 3.08 %-change [1.00 %; 5.21 %] per 10 dB(A) increase in L<sub>den</sub> (10 m)). Associations were robust with all outcomes after adjusting for air pollutants and surrounding greenness, and effect modification by obesity and hypertension was observed for SCAAT, SCTAT and hepatic fat content. Our findings indicate that annual exposure to road traffic noise is associated with increased adipose tissue depots and hepatic fat content, and thus present novel evidence for the cross-sectional association between noise and early MRI-derived metabolic health markers.

Environment InternationalVol. 201
University of Freiburg (DE), German Cancer Research Center (DE), Max Delbrück Center (DE), Heidelberg University (DE), Universitätsmedizin Greifswald (DE), University Medical Center Freiburg (DE), University Hospital Heidelberg (DE), Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e. V. (DLR) (DE), Helmholtz Zentrum München (DE), LMU Klinikum (DE), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (DE), Düsseldorf University Hospital (DE), Leibniz Institute for Prevention Research and Epidemiology - BIPS (DE), German Center for Lung Research (DE), Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Medicine (DE), Deutsches Diabetes-Zentrum e.V. (DE), German Center for Diabetes Research (DE), Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (DE), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (DE)
Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, Leibniz-Gemeinschaft
Openalex Percentile: Top 5%
Noise Effects and Management
6.24
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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