13. 09. 2024
Reading time: 1 minute
Air pollution can play a crucial role in the development of Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative diseases. That was confirmed in international studies by scientists from the Dept. of Toxicology and Molecular Epidemiology of the IEM CAS and partner institutions. The toxic effects of traffic emissions have a negative impact on the function of human mitochondria.
“Ultrafine particles are extremely small particles; they are actually smaller in size than the wavelength of light, and approximately we can say that they are thousands of times smaller in diameter than the diameter of a human hair, and thanks to their small size they can penetrate the barriers in our body, so they can get through the lungs into the blood, out of the blood, and then travel to various organs“, explains scientist Táňa Závodná.
Besides scientists from the Czech Republic and Finland, the study also involved researchers from Sweden. The team plans to continue the research and expose not only the olfactory mucous membranes but also the entire human body to emissions in the laboratory.
Listen to the full broadcast in the Science Plus programme (open in a new window – available only in Czech) on Czech Radio (time 13:15).
