Mapping pesticide mixtures to cancer risk at the country scale with spatial exposomics
Despite decades of concern over the carcinogenic potential of agricultural pesticides, toxicological studies relying on single endpoints have yet to establish a definitive link between environmental pesticide exposure and cancer in real-world contexts. Here we use an integrative spatial Bayesian framework that merges high-resolution environmental pesticide risk modelling with comprehensive cancer registry data to map pesticide-linked cancer clusters in Peru with unprecedented precision. Our process-based model, encompassing 31 key pesticide active ingredients, together with an innovative stratification of cancer cases by developmental lineage, reveals a robust spatial association between environmental pesticide exposure risk and cancer incidence. In pesticide-associated cancer hotspots, exposomic profiling of liver tissue-a primary target of chemical carcinogens-uncovers a distinct transcriptomic signature of pesticide exposure, implicating a non-genotoxic mode of action that disrupts core regulatory circuitries sustaining cell identity. Collectively, these findings strongly support a mechanistic link between pesticide exposure and cancer, challenging assumptions of human non-carcinogenicity derived from reductionist experimental models. This study redefines the exposome as a lineage-conditioned, mechanistically tractable framework and shows how complex pesticide mixtures can contribute to carcinogenic trajectories, with profound and far-reaching implications for global health policy and socio-ecological equity.
Authors
- Tatiana Vidaurre (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1995-4560)
- Jorge Honles (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3015-5321)
- Thomas Condom (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4408-8580)
- Sandro A. Casavilca-Zambrano
- Stéphane Bertani (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0398-9745)
- Pascal Pineau (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9407-1592)
- Agnès Marchio (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6541-5395)
- Claudia Monge
- Eric Deharo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5664-9517)
- Olivier Dangles (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1987-8433)
- Eloy Ruiz
- Juan Contreras-Mancilla
- Ramiro Fernández
- Juan Pablo Cerapio
- Swann Zerathe
- Javier Herrera-Zuñiga
Institutions
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Inserm (FR)
- Institut Pasteur (FR)
- École Pratique des Hautes Études (FR)
- Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia (PE)
- Université Paris Cité (FR)
- Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador (EC)
- Centre de Recherches en Cancérologie de Toulouse (FR)
- Institut National de Recherche pour l'Agriculture, l'Alimentation et l'Environnement (FR)
- Centre d'Écologie Fonctionnelle et Évolutive (FR)
- Institut des Sciences de la Terre (FR)
- Institut des Géosciences de l'Environnement (FR)
- Instituto Nacional de Enfermedades Neoplásicas (PE)
- Pharmacochimie et Biologie pour le Développement (FR)
- HKU-Pasteur Research Pole (HK)
- Université Gustave Eiffel (FR)
- Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (FR)
- Université Paris Dauphine-PSL (FR)
- University of Hong Kong (HK)
- Université Grenoble Alpes (FR)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Nature Health
- Published
- 2026-04-01
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s44360-026-00087-0
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Health, Environment, Cognitive Aging
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 16.18
Funders
- Agence Nationale de Recherches sur le Sida et les Hépatites Virales
- Institut National Du Cancer