The Impact of Early Life Exposure to Air Pollution on the Brain: A Diffusion <scp>MRI</scp> Study in 10–13‐Year‐Old Children With and Without <scp>ADHD</scp> Diagnosis

Recent studies indicate that air pollutants not only increase the risk of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases but also have a negative impact on the developing brain. Exposure to airborne particulate matter (PM) and nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub>2</sub>) may lead to disruption of neural development by interfering with critical maturation processes. In this study, we assessed the impact of prenatal and early life PM<sub>10</sub> and NO<sub>2</sub> exposure on diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging (dMRI) structural measures: fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), and fixel-based analysis (FBA) on a population of 425 10- to 13-year-old children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD, n = 116), a sensitive, at-risk population, and typically developing children (TD, n = 309) from the NeuroSmog study. Unlike traditional voxel-based methods, FBA allows identification of distinct fiber bundles within voxels. We show that early life exposure to NO<sub>2</sub> was associated with lower global FA and higher MD measures. However, despite having a large sample size and using state-of-the-art techniques, we found no significant fixel-level associations. Notably, we found no evidence that individuals with ADHD are more susceptible to the effects of air pollution. Combined with other studies, our results suggest that dMRI measures are the brain outcomes most consistently affected by air pollution.

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Publication Details

Journal
Human Brain Mapping
Published
2025-09-22
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/hbm.70306
Citations
4
Primary Topic
Air Quality and Health Impacts
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
4.80

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article

The Impact of Early Life Exposure to Air Pollution on the Brain: A Diffusion MRI Study in 10–13‐Year‐Old Children With and Without ADHD Diagnosis

Paulina Lewandowska, Krzysztof Skotak, Marcin Szwed, Bernadetta Izydorczyk et al.
4 citations
Human Brain Mapping
Air Quality and Health Impacts
4.80
article

The Impact of Early Life Exposure to Air Pollution on the Brain: A Diffusion MRI Study in 10–13‐Year‐Old Children With and Without ADHD Diagnosis

Paulina Lewandowska, Krzysztof Skotak, Marcin Szwed, Bernadetta Izydorczyk, Katarzyna Sitnik‐Warchulska, James Grellier, Anna Degórska, Małgorzata Lipowska, Yarema Mysak, Clemens Baumbach, Iana Markevych, Bartosz Kossowski, Claude J. Bajada, Katarzyna Kaczmarek‐Majer, Aleksandra Domagalik
article en
4 citations

Abstract

Recent studies indicate that air pollutants not only increase the risk of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases but also have a negative impact on the developing brain. Exposure to airborne particulate matter (PM) and nitrogen dioxide (NO<sub>2</sub>) may lead to disruption of neural development by interfering with critical maturation processes. In this study, we assessed the impact of prenatal and early life PM<sub>10</sub> and NO<sub>2</sub> exposure on diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging (dMRI) structural measures: fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), and fixel-based analysis (FBA) on a population of 425 10- to 13-year-old children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD, n = 116), a sensitive, at-risk population, and typically developing children (TD, n = 309) from the NeuroSmog study. Unlike traditional voxel-based methods, FBA allows identification of distinct fiber bundles within voxels. We show that early life exposure to NO<sub>2</sub> was associated with lower global FA and higher MD measures. However, despite having a large sample size and using state-of-the-art techniques, we found no significant fixel-level associations. Notably, we found no evidence that individuals with ADHD are more susceptible to the effects of air pollution. Combined with other studies, our results suggest that dMRI measures are the brain outcomes most consistently affected by air pollution.

Human Brain MappingVol. 46(14)
Jagiellonian University (PL), Instytut Biologii Doświadczalnej im. Marcelego Nenckiego (PL), University of Malta (MT), University of Exeter (GB), Medical University Plovdiv (BG), LMU Klinikum (DE), University of Gdańsk (PL), Institute of Environmental Protection (PL), Institute of Psychology (PL), Systems Research Institute (PL), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (DE), Polish Academy of Sciences (PL)
European Commission, Fundacja na rzecz Nauki Polskiej, Narodowym Centrum Nauki, European Regional Development Fund
Openalex Percentile: Top 5%
Air Quality and Health Impacts
4.80
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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