Abstract
The increase in agricultural demand and industrial production exposes the population to a large number of chemicals, including different classes of pesticides, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and toxic elements, such as arsenic, cadmium, and mercury. Human biomonitoring (HB) allows the assessment of human exposure to different environmental contaminants by determining the contaminants themselves and/or their metabolites in biological matrices (mainly blood and urine). Children are a vulnerable subgroup of the population and the occurrence of adverse effects from exposure to environmental contaminants is potentiated by developmental, dietary, and physiological factors. Biomonitoring studies are often carried out in European countries, the United States and Canada. However, in Brazil, these studies are still scarce or absent. The occurrence of oxidative stress with DNA damage is an important mechanism of toxicity after the exposure to environmental contaminants, and it can be considered an important tool to the toxicity evaluation of different chemical stressors. The oxidative stress allows the formations of the DNA adduct, 8-hydroxy-2'-deoxyguanosine (8OH-DG) predominantly, that are formed by the oxidation of guanine at the C8 position. A variety of environmental contaminants have been reported as inducers of high levels of 8OH-DG. Considering the above, the evaluation of the exposure levels to pesticides, PAHs and toxic elements in children living in different regions of the country and the possible association with oxidative stress biomarkers, such as 8OHDG, is important for the future public policy actions in our country.
|