A study led by researchers at Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health found that both maternal and paternal exposures to outdoor air pollution can negatively impact human embryo development in in vitro fertilization (IVF) cycles.
The study, published in Environment International in November, presented a novel approach to understanding the associations between air pollution, fertilization, and embryo quality by evaluating the independent associations between maternal and paternal air pollution exposure at times when a female's ovaries are producing eggs (also known as oocytes) and when a male's testicles are producing sperm.
Methods
In collaboration with researchers from Emory School of Medicine and Georgia Institute of Technology, the Rollins researchers utilized samples from 500 anonymous oocyte donors and 915 male recipient partners who were all undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) between 2008 and 2019 at a fertility center outside of Atlanta.
What They Found
Ambient exposure to organic carbon—a major element of the hazardous fine particulate matter PM2.5, which is emitted from combustion sources such as vehicle exhaust, industrial processes, and wildfires—consistently showed negative impacts with oocyte survival, fertilization, and embryo quality.
What The Experts Say
"The uniqueness of this model is that the exposures to the sperm and the oocyte are uncorrelated, which allows us to evaluate their unique impact on fertilization and embryo quality. And we saw that both maternal and paternal air pollution exposures during gametogenesis have independent, largely detrimental, effects on early embryological outcomes." — Audrey Gaskins, ScD, study lead author and associate professor of epidemiology at Rollins.
"Based on our study, and other studies, air pollution is certainly an exposure of concern for those who are seeking to reproduce and conceive. It really should be an important focus to mitigate exposures for these populations, among many other populations." — Sarah LaPointe, PhD, study first author and postdoctoral research fellow at Rollins.
