Neurotoxicants Are in the Air: Convergence of Human, Animal, and In Vitro Studies on the Effects of Air Pollution on the Brain

Table 1

Gender differences in the effects of diesel exhaust.

	FA	DE
MDA (nmol/g)
M	4.7 ± 0.2	13.3 ± 0.3**
F	2.2 ± 0.1^#	4.2 ± 0.2^*#
TNF-α (pg/mL)
M	1.4 ± 0.4	9.8 ± 1.9**
F	0.7 ± 0.1	1.7 ± 0.2^*#

Male and female mice were exposed for 6 h to diesel exhaust (DE, 250–300 μg/m³) or filtered air (FA), and levels of malondialdehyde (MDA) and of tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) were measured in the hippocampus, as markers of oxidative stress (lipid peroxidation) and neuroinflammation, respectively. Results indicate the mean (±SE) with 𝑛=3. DE versus FA: *𝑃<0.05; **𝑃<0.01. M versus F: ^#𝑃<0.05 (two-way ANOVA followed by Bonferroni test for multiple comparisons) (from [104]; Costa et al., unpublished results).