ET sessions

ET1 - Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products – Emerging Environmental Pollutants

Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products as pollutants (PPCPs) are being released into the environment in large quantities on a regular basis. Due to the fact that PPCPs dissolve easily in aqueous media and don't normally evaporate at normal temperatures or pressure, they make their way into the soil and aquatic environments, mainly via sewage. Many disposed PPCPs are persistent in the environment and remain biologically active. This situation may result in unpredictable biochemical interactions when they mix together. Although the concentrations of some PPCPs detected in investigated water bodies worldwide are low, research is still immature to rule out the threat of PPCPs to human health. Some of the expected potential effects of PPCPs on living organisms are: delayed development in fish and frogs, delayed metamorphosis in frogs, increased feminization of fish populations, and a variety of reactions including altered behavior and reproduction.

Conveners: Amjad Shraim
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ET2 - Asthma and Allergies in Children and Adults: Role of anthropogenic emissions and search for protective factors with special reference to trace elements

In urban areas, the prevalence of asthma and allergies is increasing and appears higher as compared to rural communities. Westernized life style, type of farming, diet and exposure to environmental pollutants can simultaneously interact in the determination of this phenotype in genetically predisposed individuals. This session intend to examine whether and to what extent anthropogenic airborne contaminants in general, and trace elements including platinum group elements in particular, play a role in the output and clinical expression of allergic immune responses. Studies on anti-allergic factors will be considered, with special reference to the protective role of essential trace elements and antioxidants. Experimental, biomolecular, immunological and epidemiological studies are welcome, as well as the assessment of gene-environment interactions in identifying individuals vulnerable to adverse effects from pollutants.

Conveners: Paola Borella
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ET3 - Role of Environment in Reproductive Disorders and Immune Impairments of Humans and Animals

Environmental changes have negatively affected most biological systems and effects include not only endocrine disruptions, sex-ratio changes and decreased reproductive parameters, but also teratogenic and genotoxic effects, immune-suppression and other immune-system impairments that can lead directly to disease or increase the risk of acquiring disease. Although environmental chemicals have been shown to affect reproduction and development in single organism tests, the degree to which chemicals contribute to the decline of reproductive and immune functions in human and animals, either alone or in concert with other factors such as climate change is still uncertain. This session will address the role of environmental chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyl, toxic trace elements, pesticides and other well know endocrine disruptors in deficits of reproductive and immune parameters and functions. Experimental, biomolecular, immunological and epidemiological studies are welcome.

Conveners: Paola Borella
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ET4 - Epigenetic and Genetic Mechanisms and Environmental Factors in Disease Etiology

Environmental exposure can induce changes in gene regulation associated with human diseases. Toxicogenomic technologies allow complete assessment of the functional activity of biochemical pathways, and of the structural genetic differences among individuals, that were previously unattainable. Environmental pollution, together with predisposing genetic factors, plays a key role in determining short and long-term adverse effects on human health. Epigenetic changes are thus a biological response to environmental stress factors and may be transmitted to the offspring. The epigenome is easily affected by different factors, such as aberrations of normal epigenetic processes that can be caused by environmental factors as exposure to xenobiotics, social behavior and nutritional deficiencies. Moreover, the gene expression screening through high through-put techniques like microarray, represent a new tool for the identification of new epigenetic indicators in order to monitor the early biological effects on the population exposed to xenobiotics.

Conveners: Elena Sturchio, Claudio Minoia
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ET5 - Toxico Kinetics & Fate of Pesticides in Biological Systems, Food & Environment

Widespread use of different pesticides having inherent toxicity pose hazards to the human/animal health, food & environment as a whole, if consumed injudiciously. Toxico kinetics & fate of pesticides are of tremendous importance from health point of view. The researches on these specific fields pursuing globally for assessing the quantum of toxicity, impact & their decontamination in bio and ecological systems can present their finding in the following subsections: i) Quantification of pesticides, analytical & bioanalytical methods in different substrates; ii) Toxico-kinetics & disposition of insecticides, fungicides, herbicides & other pesticides, in small & large animals; iii) Degradation & metabolism, identification of new derivatives & proposition of metabolic pathway in diverse substrates; iv) Remediation strategies & new pesticide formulations to reduce their environmental impact; v) Regulatory measures in different countries & their harmonization for food & environmental safety.

Conveners: Ashim Chowdhury, Sabino A. Bufo
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One aspect of Medical Geology that has received less attention is the role that biogeoche-mical processes play in exerting or exacerbating such contaminant exposures. For example, As exposures are often a result of changing redox conditions within a hydrologic unit, driven by biogeochemical processes. Mercury exposures are also driven by biogeochemical processes, wherein the conversion of inorganic mercury to the neurotoxic and bioaccumulative methylmercury is driven by natural microbial processes in wetlands.
This session will explore the role of biogeochemical processes in Medical Geology. In many cases these processes may enhance the human health impacts of naturally occurring contaminants, although a reduction of impacts is also possible.

Conveners: William H. Orem
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The phytoaccessibilty of trace elements in soil is governed by several factors, such as pH, redox potential, organic matter, content of clay and oxides/hydroxides influencing element adsorption, etc. These factors dictate the migration of trace elements in the soil solution and their chemical speciation, which are the key issues for element mobility and plant availability. Different element species are taken up across the root plasma membrane through different processes, e.g., active transport mediated by diverse transporters. This session will cover the following topics: i) Study of element phytoaccessibilty in soil; ii) Plant uptake of element species; iii)Transport of element species in plants; iv) Element speciation in plant food and feed; v) Risk/benefit assessment of trace elements species in the food chain; vi) Speciation and the impact of geochemical anomalies on human health.

Conveners: Francesco Cubadda
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Health, production and reproduction of livestock and wildlife could be affected by local geological anomalies and anthropogenic environmental changes. They are closely associated with their natural environment and could, ideally, also serve as sentinels. Seeing that animal products are consumed by humans, another dimension is added, namely public health. Trace element deficiencies or imbalances may be detrimental to animals in some areas, but the overabundance of certain elements (naturally or man-made) in other areas may even cause mortality. Veterinarians, animal scientists, geologists, geochemists, hydrologists, livestock and wildlife managers, agronomists, and policy makers should be primed to take note of their geological environment and manage livestock and wildlife accordingly. For this session, the ideal situation is not only to get international scientists together to present their “Veterinary Geology” findings, but also to discuss ideas and issues related to soil-plant-animal interactions.

Conveners: Jan Myburgh
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In Environmental Toxicology and Medical Geology, biomonitoring is a tool with great potential to assess the health risks of human exposures to harmful chemicals in the environment, in order to achieve corrective actions of prevention together with health and environmental interventions. It is conducted by collecting samples of human fluids and/or tissues to measure specific biomarkers. A biomarker is defined as any alteration in cells or biochemical processes that can be measured in a biological system or sample. They can be classified as “biomarkers of exposure”, “biomarkers of effect” or “biomarkers of susceptibly”. Nowadays, new analytical methods to quantify human biomarkers of chemical exposure in small samples have been developed for many substances. Contributions to this session will be on biomonitoring in public health risk assessment, development of implementation strategies to monitor exposures and early effects in human or animal populations, and new trends in biomarkers research.

Conveners: Nelly Mañay
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Metals are an important and emerging class of carcinogens. At least three metals, specifically nickel, chromium and arsenic, are proved to be human carcinogens, and many others are suspected to have a carcinogenic potential in human beings. Given the short list of known human carcinogens of any type, it follows that metals make up the most of it. Relatively little attention has been paid to the topic of metal carcinogenesis. The lack of interest may have been due to the fact that metals are the simplest of molecules and their mechanism of action is thought to be simple as well. This could not be further from the truth and, although no clear mechanisms have emerged in the area of metal carcinogenesis, they appear to be anything but simple. This session will highlight the recent research activities both on metal carcinogenesis and the intricate nature of metal interactions in biologic systems, providing a forum to stimulate and promote a discussion on their effects upon human health.

Conveners: José A. Centeno
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Asbestos group minerals have been the cause of mesothelioma, a rare but a deadly cancer, in many parts of the world for the past fifty years. Erionite, a zeolite group mineral, is more carcinogenic than asbestos and causing mesothelioma specifically in certain villages of Central Anatolia, Turkey. More than 50 % population of the three villages in that part of Turkey has mesothelioma. Recently, mesothelioma is identified in Mexico and few other places in USA. In addition to regulatory asbestos, “non-regulatory” asbestos group minerals (i.e., fluoro-edenite, balangeroite, etc.) identified in Italy and USA were also observed causing mesothelioma. This session would be an excellent platform to discuss new developments about mesothelioma inducing minerals and participating from medical doctors, pathologists, geneticists, medical geologists, and mineralogist-geochemists from universities and organizations will be encouraged.

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ET12 - Solving Medical Questions with Geochemistry: Disease Inception, Diagnosis, and Treatment

"Nothing begets good science as much as the development of a good instrument" -
Sir Humphrey Davy (1778-1829)
This session gathers scientific contributions about the effects on the human health of exposure to geological materials lato sensu. The geochemical approach, often focused on processes occurring in natural interfaces, is here applied to the recognition and explanation of phenomena occurring between geological materials and typical interfaces of the human body. This session welcomes presentation of research that discusses the application of geochemical principles, methods and instrumentation to the study of human health. We especially welcome contributions that focus on the unique relation between geochemistry and the diagnosis, treatment, inception and/or progression of disease. The innovative leit-motif of this session centres on the unique perspectives and approaches applied by geochemists and their potential contributions to human health-related research.

Conveners: Robyn Hannigan, Paolo Censi
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