Uncategorized - EXIMIOUS

Registration is open for the final EXIMIOUS Symposium on emerging contaminants

The sixth EXIMIOUS Symposium, titled “Emerging contaminants: health risks associated with microplastics and indoor air quality” will take place on 31^st October 2024. Register now and join us online at 15:00 – 17:00 (CET) to learn more.

Emerging contaminants (ECs) constitute a wide range of chemicals, including flame retardants, perfluorochemicals, pharmaceuticals, microplastics and a wide range of personal care products. Many of these ECs may undergo various degrees of transformation in the environment and can often be more persistent and exhibit greater toxicity than the parent compound. In this symposium we ask ourselves what are the impact of air quality and EC exposure on human health? How do we assess the risks? And in doing so we hope to talk to the policy needs to tackle the challenges.

Our three invited experts will present their latest research on the topic, each highlighting a different aspect as shown in the programme below. A dedicated time for Q&A will follow each of the presentations. Like our previous symposia, this sixth EXIMIOUS Symposium is open to all audiences.

Programme EXIMIOUS Symposium
“Emerging contaminants: health risks associated with microplastics and indoor air quality”

Time	Title	Speaker
15:00 - 15:15	Welcome and introduction from the EXIMIOUS coordinator	Prof. Peter Hoet Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
15:15 - 15:50	Human risk assessment of microplastics	Dr. Raymond Pieters Utrecht University, the Netherlands
15:50 - 16:25	Air quality and children's cognition, with a focus on school air quality	Prof. Xavier Basagaña Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal)
16:25 - 17:00	Living in the plastic age: chemicals leaching from plastic and possible health effects	Dr. Hubert Dirven The Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Norway

Speakers

Raymond Pieters is Associate Professor in Immunotoxicology at the Institute for Risk Assessment Sciences (IRAS) of UU (Faculty of Veterinary Medicine), and Professor in Innovative Testing in Life Sciences & Chemistry at Utrecht University of Applied Sciences Utrecht. His research focuses on assessment of effects of substances (e.g. drugs, pollutants, microplastics) on inflammatory processes and immune responses. He has been involved in several projects focusing on immune effects of airborne pollutants and recently started working on the effects of micro- and nanoplastics on the immune system. He leads the EC-HORIZON project POLYRISK, aiming at understanding human exposure and health hazards of micro- and nanoplastic contaminants in our environment.

Xavier Basagaña has a PhD in Biostatistics from Harvard University and is Research Professor at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal). His research lines include the effects of air pollution and temperatures on health, and the development of statistical models for epidemiology, having co-authored 270 scientific papers. He was the coordinator of the H2020 project CitieS-Health, which applied a Citizen Science approach to the study of the links between the environment and health. Currently, he is leading work packages and task in the European projects ATHLETE, on exposome research; INTERCAMBIO, on heat exposure and health in outdoor workers; InChildHealth, on indoor air pollution and children’s health; and RI-URBANS, on novel air quality metrics and health.

Hubert Dirven has been serving as the Department Director at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health since 2013. Currently, the Department of Chemical Toxicology, under his leadership, is responsible for providing evaluations on REACH chemicals to both the Norwegian Environment Agency and the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA). The research that is conducted in the department focusses on finding causal relationship (AOPs) for the effects of chemicals on the human body. Advanced in vitro models to study the effects of chemicals on the developmental nervous system and the immune system are established in the department.

EXIMIOUS Project Meeting in Oslo, Norway (05-06 September 2024)

EXIMIOUS Project Meeting in Oslo, Norway (05-06 September 2024)

The EXIMIOUS consortium gathered for a their internal General Assembly meeting from 5-6 September 2024 in Oslo, Norway, hosted by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH). The event provided a platform for key project updates, in-depth scientific discussions, and preparations for the upcoming review.

The meeting agenda was designed to facilitate collaborative progress, with a focus on data management, analysis, and integration across various work packages (WPs). The key sessions were structured as follows:

Session 1: EXIMIOUS Data Flow
This session outlined the project’s data handling processes, detailing what data is being collected, analysed, and made available.
- Session 1a: Data Collection and Analysis (WP2 – WP3)
  Focused on the collection and initial analysis of data across different work streams.
- Session 1b: In-depth Data Analysis (WP4 – WP5)
  Explored advanced techniques used in data analysis to generate actionable insights.
Session 2: Data Integration (WP6)
This session addressed the integration of data from various sources, ensuring seamless cross-WP collaboration and enhancing the overall project impact.
Session 3: Scientific Presentations
A platform for researchers to present key findings and discuss scientific progress within the EXIMIOUS project.
Session 4: Tools and Publications (Part 1, Group Discussion)
Participants engaged in discussions on the tools and publications emerging from the project, highlighting their relevance to both academic and public stakeholders.
Session 5: Rehearsal for Review Meeting
In preparation for the upcoming project review, this session focused on aligning the consortium’s presentation strategy and key deliverables.
Session 6: Tools and Publications (Part 2, Group Discussion)
Continuing the discussions from Session 4, this part further explored the project’s outputs and potential for future publications.
Session 7: Communication, Dissemination, Exploitation, and Management
The final session was dedicated to strategies for effectively communicating and disseminating project results, as well as ensuring the sustainable exploitation of EXIMIOUS outcomes.

The meeting was a significant step in the project’s timeline, strengthening collaboration among consortium partners and setting the stage for future milestones.

New EXIMIOUS SOP tool for biological samples published

The EXIMIOUS project has released a new Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) tool as part of their toolbox to standardise the collection, storage, and shipment of biological samples for analysing internal exposome markers.

The EXIMIOUS project, which gathers extensive data to study exposome markers, operates across diverse sites such as mines, factories, and hospitals. This complexity necessitates a unified protocol to ensure sample consistency and quality across various centers and partner organisations.

The new SOP tool outlines detailed procedures for sample collection, processing, storage, and shipment, with a strong focus on maintaining sample integrity. Quality assurance was a key focus, with pilot samples being collected and assessed before finalising the protocols.

For more information and to access the SOP tool, visit the EXIMIOUS project website.

Read the recently published sixth EHEN newsletter spotlighting the network’s progress

The European Human Exposome Network (EHEN) has recently published the sixth issue of its newsletter, packed with updates and insights from all projects. This edition features a preview of the HEAP Symposium, which will present the latest results from the EHEN Working Group on Ethics and Law.

Beyond the symposium preview, the newsletter will provide comprehensive progress updates from all EHEN projects, including EXPANSE, ATHLETE, EQUAL-LIFE, LONGITOOLS, EPHOR, REMEDIA, and HEDIMED. Readers can expect the latest biographies of key researchers, news highlights, upcoming events, and recent publications across the network.

The May 2024 newsletter is available online. Stay informed for an in-depth look at how these collaborative efforts are advancing our understanding of the environmental impacts on health and driving innovative solutions.

‘Internal effect markers’ – Take-aways from the 6th EXIMIOUS Symposium

The sixth EXIMIOUS Symposium was held online Thursday, 7 March 2024, attracting around 40 participants. This edition, titled “Internal effect markers: immune, genetics and epigenetics”, zoomed in on the topic of the impacts environmental and occupational exposures have on our health through three talks by the invited experts Dr. Unni Cecilie Nygaard (Norwegian Institute of Public Health), Dr. Mariona Bustamante (Barcelona Institute for Global Health), and Dr. Rossella Alfano (Hasselt University, Centre for Environmental Sciences). Did you miss the event? Read on as we share our key takeaways from the symposium with you. You can also watch the full video recording on the EXIMIOUS YouTube channel.

After a brief introduction to the EXIMIOUS project and the symposium by EXIMIOUS coordinator Prof. Peter Hoet (KU Leuven), the presentations kicked off with a talk from an EXIMIOUS researcher Dr. Unni Cecilie Nygaard from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH). She was the first to present her work on single cell profiling by mass cytometry as a promising tool for advancing environmental health and toxicology. As Dr. Nygaard explains, various environmental factors (e.g. air pollution, chemicals, etc.) have increased the incidence rate of immune diseases, which result in adverse health effects such as auto-immunity, increased hyper-sensitivity or immuno-suppression. With a lack of guideline tests to identify sensitive and relative endpoints, there is a need for new methods to identify diseases associated with immunotoxicity. Dr. Nygaard explained that the new methods should consider two important concepts: to capture the complexity of the immune system and the depth of the immune response. To achieve this, her research has focused on the use of single cell profiling by mass cytometry (CyTOF) to capture the two concepts. The advantage of using this method is that you get high-dimensional information about the phenotype and functions of a cell from a single sample. In one of Dr. Nygaard’s ongoing studies in the EXIMIUOS project, demonstrated that the method of single cell analysis is a sensitive tool to reveal immune cell profiles associated with diseases. Future research will enhance these insights and exploit other sensitive endpoints such as metabolism and epigenetic markers.

The second speaker, Dr. Mariona Bustamante from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGGlobal) in Spain, presented a perspective on the topic of epigenetic marks of the exposome. More specifically, how the internal exposome is measured using candidate biomarkers or omics technologies, which is a way to quantify various biological molecules in a cell. Dr. Bustamante explains how DNA methylation, a type of epigenetic modification that regulates gene expression, can be used to study biological mechanisms connected to the exposome and predict exposures that lead to various diseases. In one of Dr. Bustamante’s ongoing studies, epigenetic data was used to study the biological mechanism of maternal smoking during pregnancy and the placental genome. The study revealed an increased number of DNA methylation sites in the placenta of smoking mothers which is directly associated with the quantity of smoking during the pregnancy. In this context, it means that some factors crucial for fetal development are affected. The take-home message? Epigenetic data can be used not only to study biological mechanisms but also to predict exposures and associated diseases.

The final talk from Dr. Rossella Alfano from the Hasselt University, Centre for Environmental Sciences (CMK) in Belgium, presented her research and insights from multi-omics analysis, specifically to unlock the role of cholesterol in birthweight. As Dr. Alfano explains, there have been many studies that directly relate smoking during pregnancy to a variation of birthweight and the occurrence of diseases in later life. In one of Dr. Alfano’s studies, the exposome-wide study with the use of multi-omics was able to detect exposures directly related to cholesterol in mothers and birthweight of children. Future research will enhance these insights by looking at the potential association of cholesterol in birthweight with childhood traits and disease correlation.

The EXIMIOUS consortium would like to thank the speakers for sharing their latest work and valuable insights with the audience. It is evident that their research will a great impact on society.

We are looking forward to bringing you more exposome research highlights at the next EXIMIOUS Symposium in Autumn 2024, so stay tuned! If you’d like to be notified about the next symposia you can also subscribe here and we’ll send you an invitation in due time.

EXIMIOUS launches first online tool: DMP-CHECK

One of EXIMIOUS’s main objectives is to develop a toolbox catering to diverse stakeholders, facilitating their understanding and use of the project’s findings, outcomes and results. This toolbox will provide resources tailored for patients, researchers, policymakers, and decision-makers, empowering them to generate data and insights, even beyond the end of the EXIMIOUS project.

EXIMIOUS has published its first online tool. Named DMP-CHECK, it focuses on Data Management Planning (DMP), essential for occupational and environmental exposome research.

Drawing from insights gained in the EU-funded Horizon 2020 EXIMIOUS project, the DMP-CHECK addresses challenges in data collection and analysis. It ensures compliance with ethical and legal standards while making research data FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) and GDPR compliant.

The tool, accompanied by an explanatory video can be found online.

EXIMIOUS scientific meeting 2024: advancing research on exposure-induced immune effects

Barcelona, February 22-23, 2024

In a collaborative effort to propel advancements in understanding exposure-induced immune effects, the EXIMIOUS scientific meeting took place at the esteemed Vall d’Hebron Research Institute in Barcelona from 22-23 February 2024. The event, organised and hosted by the Institute, saw participation of 40 people representing the 16 partners involved in the EXIMIOUS project.

The EXIMIOUS project, funded by the European Union, is dedicated to Mapping Exposure-Induced Immune Effects: Connecting the Exposome and the Immunome. With the ultimate goal of shedding light on the intricate interplay between environmental exposures and immune responses, the project aims to pave the way for more targeted interventions and treatments.

The two-day event was structured into seven sessions, each delving into different aspects crucial to the project’s overarching objectives covering Biological Sample Collection and Analysis, Exposure Assessment, Scientific Presentations and Discussions, Publications and Research Focus, Data Integration, Management and Coordination and Communication, Dissemination, and Exploitation

The EXIMIOUS scientific meeting highlights the collaborative efforts aimed at unraveling the complexities of exposure-induced immune effects. By bringing together the EXIMIOUS partners’ expertise from diverse backgrounds and disciplines, the event not only facilitated knowledge exchange but also laid the groundwork for future innovations in the field.

Registration is open for sixth EXIMIOUS Symposium on internal effect markers

The sixth EXIMIOUS Symposium, titled “Internal effect markers: immune, genetics and epigenetics” will take place on 7^th March 2024. Register now and join us online at 15:00 – 17:00 (CEST) to learn more.

People are often exposed to multiple substances from different sources at the same time. Several of these environmental and occupational factors (exposures) have significant impact on our health. Knowledge of the biological response can help us better understand the effect of such exposure and mechanisms underlying different environmental and occupational diseases. This can be achieved by studying the biological responses to external factors, through molecular and omics analyses (immunome, epigenome, proteome…).

Our three invited experts will present their latest research on the topic, each highlighting a different aspect

Dr. Unni Cecilie Nygaard’s presentation will focus on single cell profiling by mass cytometry – a promising tool for advancing environmental health and toxicology. After this, Dr. Mariona Bustamante from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) will focus on epigenetic marks of the exposome. Lastly, Dr. Rossella Alfano will present her research and insights from multi omics analysis, specifically on unlocking the role of cholesterol in birthweight.

A dedicated time for Q&A will follow each of the presentations. Like our previous symposia, this sixth EXIMIOUS Symposium is open to all audiences.

Programme EXIMIOUS Symposium
“Internal effect markers: immune, genetics and epigenetics ”

Time	Title	Speaker
15:00 - 15:15	Welcome and introduction from the EXIMIOUS coordinator	Prof. Peter Hoet Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
15:15 - 15:50	Single cell profiling by mass cytometry – a promising tool for advancing environmental health and toxicology	Dr. Unni Cecilie Nygaard Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH), Norway
15:50 - 16:25	Epigenetic marks of the exposome	Dr. Mariona Bustamante Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), Spain
16:25 - 17:00	Unlocking the role of cholesterol in birthweight: insights from multi omics analysis	Dr. Rossella Alfano University of Hasselt, Centre for Environmental Sciences, Belgium

Speakers

Unni Cecilie Nygaard, PhD, is a researcher in the field of immunology, and is heading the Section for Immunology at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. She has extensive experience within immunotoxicology and environmental health, lately involving studies of effects of environmental exposures on immune cell function. Unni is passionate about exploiting the opportunities of high dimensional single cell analyses and systems immunology within the fields of immunotoxicology, environmental medicine, vaccinology and infection control. She is the work package leader for WP4 Immunome in EXIMIOUS.

Mariona Bustamante has a in biochemistry and human genetics. Her PhD focused on the identification of genetic variants associated to complex diseases and the functional validation in in vitro models. Currently, she investigates the genetic causes of complex phenotypes and their interaction with environmental exposures. She joined ISGlobal in 2010 as a postdoctoral researcher and now has a position as staff scientist in the area of molecular epidemiology.

Rossella Alfano is a Medical Doctor, qualified specialist in Public Health at the University ‘Federico II’, (Naples, Italy). In 2017, Dr. Alfano joined the Epidemiology group of the Centre for Environmental Science at the Hasselt University (Hasselt, Belgium). Under the mentorship of Professor Michelle Plusquin, she completed her PhD in Biomedical Sciences. She now serves as junior Postdoctoral Researcher funded by the Research Foundation – Flanders. Her research interests include epidemiology, birth cohort research and omics. Her main work focuses on integrating omics (epigenomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics) to elucidate the mechanisms underlying health and disease across the lifespan.

New publication: Data management and protection in occupational and environmental exposome research – A case study from the EU-funded EXIMIOUS project

We are happy to announce that our new publication on “Data management and protection in occupational and environmental exposome research – A case study from the EU-funded EXIMIOUS project” has been published by Environmental Research and is available to read online.

Within collaborative projects, such as the EU-funded Horizon 2020 EXIMIOUS project (Mapping Exposure-Induced Immune Effects: Connecting the Exposome and the Immunome), collection and analysis of large volumes of data pose challenges in the domain of data management, with regards to both ethical and legal aspects. However, researchers often lack the right tools and/or accurate understanding of the ethical/legal framework to independently address such challenges. With the guidance and support within and between the partner institutes (the researchers and the ethical and legal teams) in the EXIMIOUS project, we have been able to understand and solve most challenges during the first two project years. This has fed into the development of a Data Management Plan and the establishment of data management platforms in accordance with the ethical and legal framework laid down by the EU and the different national regulations of the partners involved. Through this elaborate exercise, we have acquired tools which allow us to make our research data FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable), while at the same time ensuring data privacy and security (GDPR compliant). Herein we share our experience of creating and managing the data workflow through an open research communication, with the aim of helping other researchers build their data management framework in their own projects. Based on the measures adopted in EXIMIOUS to ensure FAIR data management, we also put together a checklist “DMP CHECK” containing a series of recommendations based on our experience.

‘Risk assessment of mixed exposures’ – Take-aways from the 5th EXIMIOUS Symposium

Mapping Exposure-Induced Immune Effects: Connecting the Exposome and the Immunome

‘Risk assessment of mixed exposures’ – Take-aways from the 5th EXIMIOUS Symposium

5 October, 2023

The fifth EXIMIOUS Symposium was held online on Thursday, 28 September 2023, attracting 60 participants. This edition, titled “Risk assessment of mixed exposures: particles, carcinogens, and EU policies”, zoomed in on the topic of combined exposure through three talks by the invited experts Prof. Ulla Vogel (National Research Centre for the Working Environment), Prof. Tiina Santonen (Finnish Institute of Occupational Health), and Dr. Violaine Verougstraete (Eurometaux).

Did you miss (parts of) the event? Read on as we share our key takeaways from the symposium with you. You can also watch the full video recording on the EXIMIOUS YouTube channel.

After a brief introduction to the EXIMIOUS project and the symposium by EXIMIOUS coordinator Prof. Peter Hoet (KU Leuven), the presentations kicked off with a talk by EXIMIOUS researcher Prof. Ulla Vogel from the National Research Centre for the Working Environment in Denmark. Her research shows that inhalation of particles is a risk factor for the development of cardiovascular disease. More specifically, the key mechanism at work involves induction of the acute phase response in the lung and liver. Acute phase response is a systemic response to inflammatory states that can be caused by different factors. The acute phase response is causally related to atherosclerosis. In this case, it is triggered by the particles retained in the lung. This mechanism has been shown to apply to more than 100 different particles and nanomaterials tested. Prof. Vogel also shows that particle size matters when it comes to predicting the health effects of inhaling particles: the acute phase response is predicted by the total surface area of the particles retained in the lung. The take-home message? Cardiovascular disease is a preventable particle-induced occupational disease, and there is a huge preventive potential. The association with particle-induced acute phase response may help us establish safe exposure limits in the future, for both single and mixed exposure.

There is a huge preventive potential here, and there is evidence that reduction of particle exposure will reduce cardiovascular mortality.

Prof. Vogel about cardiovascular disease

From particles we moved to the risk assessment of combined exposure to carcinogenic metals, the topic of research conducted by Prof. Tiina Santonen and colleagues in the HBM4EU project. As Prof. Santonen explains, when considering the combined effects of exposure to multiple substances, an additive effect is usually assumed if it involves the same target organ and a similar mode of action. However, sometimes the given substances have different dose responses, as illustrated by an HBM4EU case study on hexavalent chromium, nickel, and PAHs using air monitoring. Nickel’s dose response, i.e. the relationship between the level of exposure and the magnitude of the risk effects, is different from that of the other two metals. For this reason, this mode of calculation cannot be considered as fully representative. In one of Prof. Santonen’s ongoing studies, biomonitoring data is taken into account in addition to air monitoring data. Measuring exposure levels in the body, e.g. in urine, means that the impact of respiratory protection worn by workers is also considered. Interestingly, the risk assessment picture resulting from this study is quite different from the one from the previous air monitoring study. Future research will further enhance these insights on different approaches to the risk assessment of combined exposure.

Usually, additivity is assumed in the case of substances which have similar target and similar mode of action, unless there is information on potential synergistic effects.

Prof. Santonen about the general assessment of combined exposure

The final talk took yet another perspective on the topic of mixed exposure: Adding the “regulatory spices on the science” in her own words, Dr. Violaine Verougstraete looked at how the toxicological challenge of mixed exposure will be dealt with in EU policy, in the new REACH legislation in particular. Over the past decades, there has been a growing recognition that exposure to a cocktail of chemicals may also generate risks that are not captured by a substance-by-substance risk assessment. REACH 2.0, currently under revision, will address the challenge of combined exposure by introducing a Mixture Allocation Factor (MAF). This is a default numerical value which adds an uncertainty factor to the risk calculation. As Dr. Verougstraete explained, this can be seen as a kind of shortcut, simplifying the assessment, but it is also very much a pragmatic tool which we have to rely on when we lack most of the data needed to make a more refined assessment. For industry, this means that demonstrating the safety of their products will become more challenging with the required application of the MAF. In this context, Dr. Verougstraete briefly presented the scientific programme launched by Eurometaux to tackle these issues in the metals sector. While the MAF in REACH 2.0 will be a practical basis for decision-making and risk management, she concludes, there are still “a lot of things that are still subject to the scientific community to see whether that concept is actually a valid one and whether we have to adapt it to really provide for safe assessments of substances in the environment.”

There are [...] a lot of things that are still subject to the scientific community to see whether that concept is actually a valid one and whether we have to adapt it to really provide for safe assessments of substances in the environment.

Dr. Verougstraete about the Mixture Allocation Factor

As the three lectures in this symposium have highlighted, the risk assessment of mixed exposures involves many interesting challenges, for scientists, regulators, and industry, not all of which we can solve today. At the same time, it has been encouraging and exciting to see the promising latest scientific progress presented by our three guest speakers. It is evident that their research will have a great impact on the environment and society we live in. The EXIMIOUS consortium would like to thank the speakers for sharing their latest work and valuable insights with the audience.

We are looking forward to bringing you more exposome research highlights at the next EXIMIOUS Symposium in 2024, so stay tuned! If you’d like to be notified about the next symposia you can also subscribe here and we’ll send you an invitation in due time.