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Adapting Concepts from Systems Biology to Develop Systems Exposure Event Networks for Exposure Science Research
Citation:
PLEIL, J. D. AND L. S. SHELDON. Adapting Concepts from Systems Biology to Develop Systems Exposure Event Networks for Exposure Science Research. BIOMARKERS. Informa Healthcare, London, Uk, 16(2):99-105, (2011).
Impact/Purpose:
The National Exposure Research Laboratory′s (NERL) Human Exposure and Atmospheric Sciences Division (HEASD) conducts research in support of EPA′s mission to protect human health and the environment. HEASD′s research program supports Goal 1 (Clean Air) and Goal 4 (Healthy People) of EPA′s strategic plan. More specifically, our division conducts research to characterize the movement of pollutants from the source to contact with humans. Our multidisciplinary research program produces Methods, Measurements, and Models to identify relationships between and characterize processes that link source emissions, environmental concentrations, human exposures, and target-tissue dose. The impact of these tools is improved regulatory programs and policies for EPA.
Description:
Systems exposure science has emerged from the traditional environmental exposure assessment framework and incorporates new concepts that link sources of human exposure to internal dose and metabolic processes. Because many human environmental studies are designed for retrospective exposure evaluations they often do not provide practical toxicological outcome parameters. Our goal was to examine concepts from systems biology research and adapt them to a network approach that maps forward to a perturbation event using two hypothetical examples. The article proposes that environmental exposure studies should not only retrospectively document exposure levels, but also measure biological parameters that can be used to inform relevant systemic changes.
URLs/Downloads:
Biomarkers
Adapting Concepts from Systems Biology to Develop Systems Exposure Event Networks for Exposure Science Research (PDF, NA pp, 904 KB, about PDF)