Urinary ¹H NMR metabolomics profile of Italian citizens exposed to background levels of arsenic: a (pre)cautionary tale

Abstract

Objectives: Arsenic is a toxic metal ubiquitous in the environment and in daily life items. Long-term arsenic exposure is associated with severe adverse health effects involving various target organs. It would be useful to investigate the existence of metabolic alterations associated with lifestyle and/or with the environment. For this purpose, we studied the correlation between urinary arsenic levels and urinary proton nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (¹H NMR) metabolomics profiles in a non-occupationally nor environmentally arsenic exposed general population.

Methods: Urine samples were collected from 86 healthy subjects. Total and non-alimentary urinary arsenic (U-naAs) levels, namely the sum of arsenite, arsenate, monomethylarsonate and dimethylarsinate, were measured and ¹H NMR analysis was performed. Orthogonal Projection to Latent Structures was applied to explore the correlation between the metabolomics profiles and U-naAs levels.

Results: Despite the extremely low U-naAs levels (mean value = 6.13 ± 3.17 µg/g creatinine) of our studied population a urinary metabolomics profile related to arsenic was identified.

Conclusion: The identified profile could represent a fingerprint of early arsenic biological effect and could be used in further studies as an indicator of susceptibility, also in subjects exposed to a low arsenic dose, with implications in occupational health, toxicology, and public health.

Keywords:

• Metabolomics
• ¹H NMR
• arsenic
• background exposure
• early biological effects

Author contributions

MC and EdA conceptualized the study and contributed to the overall interpretation of the data. LIL, RP, AN, and IP collected the data. EL performed the NMR experiments. EL, LIL, RP, and AN performed the data analysis and interpretation. All authors contributed to the manuscript writing and approved the submitted version of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.