Online Seminar

Fundamental considerations indicate that, for certain organic compounds, dermal absorption from air is an uptake pathway that is comparable to or greater than inhalation. Yet this pathway has not been experimentally evaluated and has been largely overlooked when assessing uptake of indoor pollutants.

In a series of experiments, human participants were exposed in a chamber containing deliberately elevated air concentrations of the target pollutants. The participants either wore a hood and breathed clean air or did not wear a hood and breathed chamber air. All urinations were collected from initiation of exposure until several days later. Metabolites of the target compounds were measured in these samples and extrapolated to parent intakes, corrected for background and hood air exposures. To assess the influence of clothing, the dermal absorption of selected airborne compounds for individuals wearing clean clothes or air-exposed clothes was measured and these results were compared with dermal absorption for the bare-skinned individuals under otherwise identical experimental conditions.