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Unravelling the signaling power of pollutants
Summary
Researchers reviewed how environmental pollutants enter the body, cross biological barriers including the blood-brain barrier, and trigger cellular damage through oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction, and inflammation, emphasizing that pollutant-receptor signaling interactions may compromise drug therapies for chronic diseases.
Exposure to environmental pollutants contributes to diverse pathologies, including pulmonary disease, lower respiratory infections, cancer, and stroke. Pollutants' entry can occur through inhalation, traversing endothelial and epithelial barriers, and crossing the blood-brain barrier, leading to a wide distribution throughout the human body via systemic circulation. Pollutants cause cellular damage by multiple mechanisms encompassing oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction, (neuro)inflammation, and protein instability/proteotoxicity. Sensing pollutants has added a new dimension to disease progression and drug failure. Understanding the molecular pathways and potential receptor binding/signaling that underpin 'sensing' could contribute to ways to combat the detrimental effects of pollutants. We highlight key points of pollutant signaling, crosstalk with receptors acting as drug targets for chronic diseases, and discuss the potential for future therapeutics.
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