Smoke Exposure Associated With Higher Urinary Benzene Biomarker Muconic Acid (Muca) in Golestan Cohort Study Participants Publisher Pubmed



Bhandari D¹ ; Zhu Y¹ ; Zhang C¹ ; Zhu W¹ ; Alexandridis A² ; Etemadi A^{3, 4} ; Freedman ND³ ; Chang C² ; Abnet CC³ ; Dawsey SM³ ; Inouechoi M³ ; Poustchi H⁴ ; Pourshams A⁴ ; Boffetta P^{5, 6} Show All Authors Show Affiliations
Source: Biomarkers Published:2023

Abstract

Background. Benzene is a known human carcinogen. Human exposure to benzene can be assessed by measuring trans, trans-muconic acid (MUCA) in urine. Golestan Province in northeastern Iran has been reported to have high incidence of esophageal cancer linked to the use of tobacco products. This manuscript evaluates the urinary MUCA concentrations among the participants of the Golestan Cohort Study (GCS). Methods. We analyzed MUCA concentration in 177 GCS participants’ urine samples and performed nonparametric pairwise multiple comparisons to determine statistically significant difference among six different product use groups. Mixed effects model was fitted on 22 participants who exclusively smoked cigarette and 51 participants who were classified as nonusers. The urinary MUCA data were collected at the baseline and approximately five years later, and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was calculated from the model. Results. Compared with nonusers, tobacco smoking was associated with higher urinary MUCA concentrations. Based on the nonparametric test of pairwise multiple comparisons, MUCA concentrations among participants who smoked combusted tobacco products were statistically significantly higher compared to nonusers. Urinary MUCA collected five years apart from the same individuals showed moderate reliability (ICC = 0.41), which was expected given the relatively short half-life (∼6 h) of MUCA. Conclusion. Our study revealed that tobacco smoke was positively associated with increased levels of urinary MUCA concentration, indicating that it is a significant source of benzene exposure among GCS participants. © This work was authored as part of the Contributor’s official duties as an Employee of the United States Government and is therefore a work of the United States Government. In accordance with 17 U.S.C. 105, no copyright protection is available for such works under U.S. Law.