High Performance Environmental Profiling of House Dust to Support Computational Exposure Science

Abstract

High Performance Environmental Profiling of House Dust to Support Computational Exposure ScienceAbstract Number:2750 Shuang Liang, Peter Egeghy*, Karen Bradham, and Mark Strynar Shuang Liang U.S. EPA Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE) Fellow, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , Peter Egeghy* U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , Karen Bradham U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , and Mark Strynar U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author AbstractFew chemicals have been sufficiently characterized for potential risks to public health. A desire to increase the pace of risk assessment has led to development of robust modeling approaches for screening of exposure potential to complement emergent toxicity screening efforts. Models that integrate chemical properties, consumer product information, and human behavior are now being used to evaluate the exposure potential of large numbers of chemicals. Measurements of chemicals are necessary to evaluate the reliability of these models, but readily available data exist for only few chemicals, typically those previously identified as a hazard to human health. Non-targeted analysis of environmental samples using high resolution mass spectroscopy allows large numbers of chemicals to be measured. We applied liquid chromatography time-of-flight/mass spectrometry (LC-TOF/MS) methods to rapidly screen dust samples obtained from the American Healthy Homes Survey. We observed 100 – 1000 peaks in each sample. Using chemical property information from EPA’s DSSTox database, we were able tentatively identify many of these chemicals. Comparison with EPA’s Consumer Product Chemical Profiling database enabled linking of dozens of compounds with consumer products. Preliminary analysis found that the majority of the identified compounds were associated with ‘beauty care’ products. High performance environmental profiling of house dust holds great promise for the evaluation and calibration of high-throughput exposure models; moreover, further application of the technique to a wider range of environmental media will facilitate integration of emerging analytical and computational technologies to assess exposure potential on a previously unattainable scale. Disclaimer: The views expressed in presentation are those of the author and do not reflect the views or policies of the United States Environmental Protection Agency.