Researchers At Duke University Find A Connection Between House Dust And Weight Gain.
A new study from the researchers at Duke University in North Carolina has revealed that endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDC’s) that are present in house dust have the ability to disrupt metabolic health that can trigger an increase in body fat, especially in children.
No, I am not joking! this is a real study that was done The Nicholas School of the environment at Duke University. Their findings were published in the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology.
EDC’s And Their Effects On Hormone Production
We’ve known for a long time that EDC’s can have an effect on hormone production and function. EDC’s or endocrine disturbing chemicals are both man-made and naturally occurring, they can be found in a wide range of products that we are exposed to Everyday, including food packaging, postal cleaning products, cosmetics, and pesticides. They can also be found in many flame retardants that are sprayed onto our furniture by manufacturers.
Some of the negative health effects that exposure to EDC’s that have been noted in the past include cancer, infertility, and neurodevelopmental disorders. Well, now you can add weight gain and obesity to the list.
Study Shows House Dust Harbors EDC’s
In a recent study, researchers were able to show that house dust harbors ECD’s And wanted to investigate exposure to house dust what effect the growth of fat cells, or adipocytes.
During the research they sampled house dust from 11 homes in North Carolina, and analyzed for levels of EDC’s, The team was able to identify 44 different contaminants in total.
The second part of the study had the researchers testing extracts from each sample on 3T3-L1 cells, which are precursor adipocyte cells derived from mice.
These are a commonly used cell for scientific research to figure out how specific compounds influence build up of triglycerides. Triglycerides are a type of fat that the body stores for energy when no other energy from food sources is present. If you have too much of this fat, it will lead to weight gain and other complications with your health.
10 Of 11 Homes Showed Activity In The Dust Samples
As we said earlier in the article the researchers gathered dust samples from 11 different homes, out of those 11 dust samples only one sample appeared completely inactive. this suggests that causative chemical are nearly ubiquitous to the indoor environment according to the authors.
During the study, it was found that 7 extracts from the house dust samples cause the cells to mature into adipocytes triglycerides. Additionally, 9 of the house dust samples triggered cell proliferation, which increases the number of precursor fat cells.
The Three Biggest Offending EDC’s Are
The researchers went on to identify the three EDC’s that had the greatest effect on triglyceride accumulation, they are pesticide pyraclostrobin, Flame retardant TBPDP, And the well-known plasticizer DBP.
The researchers also indicated that it took a mere 3 micrograms of house dust to trigger fat producing effects, the United States Environmental Protection Agency estimate that every home has approximately 50 mg of house dust. This is being ingested, inhaled, and absorbed through the skin of children every day.
Now obviously more studies need to be done to determine how EDC’s in-house dust does affect metabolic health, but the researchers do believe there is cause for concern.
Might be time to start cleaning
You can view the published study here: Article
