Annual ambient black XXXX associated with shorter telomeres in elderly @entity1 : Veterans Affairs Normative Aging Study.

@entity505 @entity1 @entity6661 @entity65
BACKGROUND: Telomere length reflects biological age and is inversely associated with risk of @entity65 ( @entity65 ). Ambient air pollution is associated with @entity65 , but its effect on telomere length is unknown. OBJECTIVE: We investigated whether ambient black @entity505 (BC), a marker for traffic-related particles, is associated with telomere length in the Normative Aging Study (NAS). METHODS: Among 165 never-smoking @entity1 from the NAS, leukocyte telomere length (LTL) was measured repeatedly approximately every 3 years from 1999 through 2006 using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR). BC concentration at their residences during the year before each LTL measurement was estimated based on a spatiotemporal model calibrated with BC measurements from 82 locations within the study area. RESULTS: The median [interquartile range (IQR)] annual moving-average BC concentration was 0.32 (0.20-0.45) microg/m3. LTL, expressed as population-standardized ratio of telomere repeat to single-copy gene copy numbers, had a geometric mean (geometric SD) of 1.25 (1.42). We used linear mixed-effects models including random subject intercepts and adjusted for several potential confounders. We used inverse probability of response weighting to adjust for potential selection bias due to loss to follow-up. An IQR increase in annual BC (0.25 microg/m3) was associated with a 7.6% decrease (95% confidence interval, -12.8 to -2.1) in LTL. We found evidence of effect modification, with a stronger association among subjects > or = 75 years of age compared with younger @entity1 (p = 0.050) and statin medications appearing protective of the effects of BC on LTL (p = 0.050). CONCLUSIONS: Telomere @entity6661 , linked to biological aging, may be associated with long-term exposures to airborne particles, particularly those rich in BC, which are primarily related to automobile traffic.
