Date/Time Date(s) - 09/10/20251:30 pm - 2:30 pm
Title: New analytical tools to sequence the exposome
Date: Thursday October 9, 2025
Time: 1:30pm-2:30pm
Room: ABB 165
Host: Dr. Joseph Okeme
Abstract:
The exposome represents all environmental exposures during a lifetime [1]. The concept was developed to underline the important relationship between an individual’s health and their environmental exposure. Currently, large swaths of the exposome remain uncharacterized: thousands of chemical substances and materials, representing millions of individual chemical compounds, have been introduced to the Canadian market, and yet relatively few have been investigated for their environmental and health impacts. Polymers and plastics have often been assumed to be of low concern, but there is growing evidence that decomposition during their lifecycle results in the release of smaller particles, coined microplastics, that can adversely affect health. This presentation will highlight the strengths and weaknesses of current regulatory efforts to minimize exposure and protect the health of Canadians; and reveal examples of the inequity of environmental pollution; while describing new tools developed by our group to identify emerging and unregulated environmental pollutants [2] through the lens of three vignettes concerning drinking water contamination in St. John’s, Newfoundland, air pollution in Sarnia and Hamilton, Ontario, and exposure to microplastics [3]. While the proposed tools will inevitably find problematic chemicals and new sources of exposure, the lessons learned from these efforts will eventually help guide the creation of guidelines and practices to limit exposure and the development of safer, more sustainable chemicals.
References.
[1] C.P. Wild, International Journal of Epidemiology, 41, 2012, 24.
[2] For selected examples, see: (a) A. MacNeil et al. Anal. Chem. 94(31) 2022, 11096-11103.; (b) K.L. Steeves et al. Environ. Int. 171 2023, 107634. ; (c) X. Li et al. Env. Sci. Technol. 59(21) 2025, 10390-10399.
[3] J. Bissonnette et al. Anal. Chim. Acta 1376, 2025, 344606.