2023 · Food and chemical toxicology : an international journal published for the British Industrial Biological Research Association · paywalled
The Austrian children's biomonitoring survey 2020 Part B: Mycotoxins, phytotoxins, phytoestrogens and food processing contaminants
Ayeni et al.
The finding, in our words
First-void urine samples from 85 Austrian school children aged six to ten showed frequent low-level exposure to mycotoxins and phytoestrogens, with 22 percent exceeding the tolerable daily intake for deoxynivalenol and some facing possible health risks from ochratoxin A. The results support urine microsampling for decentralised exposome monitoring in paediatric populations.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
The study found that levels of an acrylamide metabolite in first-void urine were significantly and inversely associated with testosterone, puberty stage and facial hair growth in boys aged 13 to 14, but not in girls, suggesting that acrylamide exposure may disrupt pubertal development in males through effects on testosterone.
Glyphosate was quantifiable in 99.8% of first-void urine samples from 6848 French adults and children, with higher levels in men and children and lower levels associated with organic food intake and filtered water; occupational exposure was higher in farmers, indicating widespread environmental contamination relevant to decentralised exposure monitoring.
The study found that higher urinary levels of certain pesticide metabolites were significantly associated with increased risk of acute lower and upper respiratory infections in children under five, particularly in those older than two years. This supports the use of decentralised urine microsampling for environmental exposure and child health studies.
Non-tobacco users who attended six-hour e-cigarette events showed up to 13-fold increases in urinary cotinine and significant rises in salivary cotinine, both peaking four hours after exposure, with acrolein metabolites also increasing but tobacco-specific nitrosamines unchanged. The multi-timepoint collection of urine including first-void specimens and saliva demonstrates how exposure biomarkers can be tracked through biological samples collected outside a clinic setting.
First-void urine from autistic children showed significantly elevated kininogen-1 compared with controls, suggesting urine proteomics could yield non-invasive screening markers for autism. The finding supports decentralised diagnostics because urine can be self-collected at home, even in paediatric populations, enabling remote biomarker discovery.