Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety
Cadmium dominates urinary heavy metal mixtures associated with COPD risk: Integrative evidence from NHANES, network pharmacology, and experimental validation
By Yincong Xue, Gen Chen, Wanying Chen and 7 others.
Abstract
Objective
This study aimed to examine the associations between heavy metal exposures and the prevalence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), identify the principal toxicant, and elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying its pathogenic effects.
Methods
We analyzed 3380 adults from three National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) cycles. Logistic regression, Bayesian Kernel Machine Regression (BKMR), and Quantile-based G-computation (qgcomp) were applied to evaluate individual and joint associations between urinary concentrations of ten heavy metals (arsenic [As], cadmium [Cd], lead [Pb], cobalt [Co], barium [Ba], cesium [Cs], molybdenum [Mo], antimony [Sb], thallium [Tl], and tungsten [W]) and COPD risk. Network pharmacology and molecular docking were used to identify Cd-related molecular targets and pathways, which were validated by immunofluorescence, and western blotting in a Cd-exposed mouse model.
