Association of maternal air pollution exposure and infant lung function is modified by genetic propensity to oxidative stress.

Introduction: The association between air pollution and poor respiratory health outcomes is well established, however less is known about the biological mechanisms, especially in early life. Children are particularly at risk from air pollution, especially during the prenatal period as their organs and systems are still undergoing crucial development. Therefore, our study aims to investigate if maternal exposure to air pollution during pregnancy is associated with oxidative stress (OS) and inflammation in pregnancy or infant lung function at 4 weeks of age, and the extent to which the association is modified by an infant's genetic risk of OS. Methods: The Barwon Infant Study (BIS) is a longitudinal study of Australian children from the region of Geelong, Victoria. A total of 314 infants had available lung function and maternal OS markers. Exposure to annual air pollutants (NO Results: There was no evidence of a relationship between maternal exposure to air pollution and infant lung function in the whole population. We did not find an association between air pollution and GlycA or OS during pregnancy. We found evidence of an association between NO Conclusion: Our study found that high prenatal levels of exposure to ambient NO