Recently. Professor He Mei 'an and Professor Wu Tangchun from the School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology published a paper entitled’ Lipid metabolic links between serum mould levels and the risk of incident type 2 diabetes: A mediation study in the prospective design’ online in Journal of Hazardous Materials (IF = 13.6, TOP 1, Chinese Academy of Sciences). Based on the nested case-control population of type 2 diabetes selected from the prospective Dongfeng-Tongji cohort, this study evaluated the spectrum of plasma lipid metabolites associated with type 2 diabetes and its mediating role in the association between serum pyrethroid levels and new-onset type 2 diabetes.

Emerging evidence revealed that pyrethroids and circulating lipid metabolites are involved in incident type 2 diabetes (T2D). However, the pyrethroid-associated lipid profile and its potential role in the association of pyrethroids with T2D remain unknown. Metabolome-wide association or mediation analyses were performed among 1006 pairs of T2D cases and matched controls nested within the prospective Dongfeng-Tongji cohort. We identified 59 lipid metabolites significantly associated with serum deltamethrin levels, of which eight were also significantly associated with serum fenvalerate (false discovery rate [FDR] < 0.05). Pathway enrichment analysis showed that deltamethrin-associated lipid metabolites were significantly enriched in the glycerophospholipid metabolism pathway (FDR = 0.02). Furthermore, we also found that several deltamethrin-associated lipid metabolites (i.e., phosphatidylcholine [PC] 32:0, PC 34:4, cholesterol ester 20:0, triacylglycerol 52:5 [18:2]), and glycerophosphoethanolamine-enriched latent variable mediated the association between serum deltamethrin levels and T2D risk, with the mediated proportions being 44.81%, 15.92%, 16.85%, 16.66%, and 22.86%, respectively. Serum pyrethroids, particularly deltamethrin, may lead to an altered circulating lipid profile primarily in the glycerophospholipid metabolism pathway represented by PCs and lysophosphatidylcholines, potentially mediating the association between serum deltamethrin and T2D. The study provides a new perspective in elucidating the potential mechanisms through which pyrethroid exposure might induce T2D.

Professor HE Meian and Professor WU Tangchun from School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College of HUST are the author of this paper, and Dr JIA Chengyong from School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College of HUST is the first author of this paper. This research is funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (82073656 and 82273717), the basic scientific research business fees of central universities, HUST (2022JYCXJJ051) and the Young Academic Frontier Team Project of Huazhong University of Science and Technology (2017QYTD18).

Paper link:https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37473566/