Silvia Canepari

Silvia Canepari
Sapienza University of Rome | la sapienza · Department of Environmental Biology

PhD

About

230
Publications
38,113
Reads
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4,216
Citations
Additional affiliations
January 2010 - present
Italian National Research Council
Position
  • Research Associate

Publications

Publications (230)
Article
Full-text available
Oxidative stress is considered one of the major mechanisms by which atmospheric particulate matter (PM) can induce adverse effects on living systems. Recently, the assessment of PM-induced oxidative stress effects has gained importance, and many efforts have been invested in identifying the most suitable techniques for evaluating PM toxicological p...
Presentation
In this study, the oxidative stress effects induced by atmospheric particulate matter on the experimental species Aedes albpoictus exposed under laboratory conditions and on the model species Drosophila melanogaster exposed under real environmental conditions in a highly impacted environment (foundry plant) were analysed.
Article
This study proposes the use of spatially resolved data to identify local sources contributing to PM10 mass concentration and OP in urban-industrial contexts. Over a 18-month monitoring campaign spanning from October 2020 to May 2022, a low-volume PM10 sampling device was employed at 12 sites in the Sacco River Valley, Italy. PM10 samples were analy...
Article
Full-text available
Peat is the main constituent of cultivation substrates and a precious non-renewable fossil material. Peatlands provide important ecosystem services and allow the absorption and storage of carbon. Protecting peatlands helps tackle climate change and contributes to biodiversity conservation. Due to its importance, it is necessary to implement strateg...
Presentation
Full-text available
A causa della complessa composizione chimico-fisica del particolato atmosferico (PM), la sola concentrazione di massa non fornisce informazioni affidabili, e del tutto rappresentative, sul suo potenziale tossicologico. In particolare, in contesti inquinati da più fonti, la valutazione della composizione del PM e dei contributi delle sorgenti emissi...
Presentation
Full-text available
Negli ultimi anni sono stati sviluppati numerosi test acellulari e cellulari per stimare lo stress ossidativo e gli effetti sulla salute indotti dall'esposizione al PM con diverse proprietà chimico-fisiche. I test acellulari valutano il potenziale ossidativo del PM, sono rapidi e hanno costi ridotti ma non è ancora stata pienamente dimostrata la lo...
Article
Full-text available
The honey bee is an important pollinator insect susceptible to environmental contaminants. We investigated the effects of a waste fire event on elemental content, oxidative stress, and metabolic response in bees fed different nutrients (probiotics, Quassia amara, and placebo). The level of the elements was also investigated in honey and beeswax. Ou...
Article
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Exposures to fine particulate matter (PM $$_1$$ 1 ) have been associated with health impacts, but the understanding of the PM $$_1$$ 1 concentration-response (PM $$_1$$ 1 -CR) relationships, especially at low PM $$_1$$ 1 , remains incomplete. Here, we present novel data using a methodology to mimic lung exposure to ambient air (2 $$<PM_1<$$ < P M 1...
Article
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Introduction: Biogenic fraction of airborne PM10 dominated by bacteria and fungi, has been recognized as serious environmental and human health issues in cities. Methods: In the present study, we combined a high-throughput amplicon sequencing of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene and the fungal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region, with elemental anal...
Poster
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Evaluation of source apportionment and oxidative potential of PM10 sampled in different urban and industrial sites in Italy
Article
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This study aims to propose an innovative, simple, rapid, and cost-effective method to study oxidative stress induced by PM through in-vivo exposure of the plant model organism Arabidopsis thaliana. A. thaliana seedlings were exposed to urban dust certified for its elemental content and to PM2.5 samples collected in an urban-industrial area of North...
Article
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Peatlands in southern South America (Tierra del Fuego region, TdF) play a key role in the ecological dynamics of Patagonia. It is, therefore, necessary to increase our knowledge and awareness of their scientific and ecological value to ensure their conservation. This study aimed to assess the differences in the distribution and accumulation of elem...
Article
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The toxicity of particulate matter (PM) is strictly associated with its physical-chemical characteristics, such as size or chemical composition. While these properties depend on the origin of the particles, the study of the toxicological profile of PM from single sources has rarely been highlighted. Hence, the focus of this research was to investig...
Article
In order to provide an updated baseline assessment of elemental concentrations in native lichens samples collected at eight selected sampling sites from Tierra del Fuego (South Patagonia), we have determined the concentration of more than forty elements in Usnea barbata by means of different analytical techniques (INAA, ICP-MS, ICP-OES, AMA and CV-...
Article
This study aimed to identify and characterise indoor sources of particulate matter (PM) in domestic environments. 74 inhabited apartments located in the urban area of Gela (Sicily, Italy), close to a refinery, and in three villages of the hinterland were evaluated, in real-world conditions, for the elemental composition of PM2.5. The samples were c...
Article
Exposure to potentially toxic trace elements (PTTEs) in inhalable particulate matter (PM10) is associated with an increased risk of developing cardiorespiratory diseases. Therefore, in multi-source polluted urban contexts, a spatially-resolved evaluation of health risks associated with exposure to PTTEs in PM is essential to identify critical risk...
Article
The indoor atmosphere of five university environments, ranging from a research laboratory to a vast lecture hall, was studied during a seven-week measurement campaign. The study was carried out in real-world conditions and was designed to distinguish periods when the environments were occupied from periods when they were empty. A comprehensive chem...
Article
In this survey, we studied the levels of relevant atmospheric elements well known as tracers of vehicular traffic (i. e., Cu, Sb, Sn, Fe, Mn); biomass burning (i.e., K, Rb, Cs, Li, Tl); and soil resuspension (Si, Al, Ca, Ti) in bees and beehive products (honey, wax, pollen, propolis) in five selected sites in the Rome province (Italy). To attentive...
Article
Full-text available
Background: The objective of this study is to evaluate the effects of traffic on human health comparing biomonitoring data measured during the COVID-19 lockdown, when restrictions led to a 40% reduction in airborne benzene in Rome and a 36% reduction in road traffic, to the same parameters measured in 2021. Methods: Biomonitoring was performed on 4...
Article
Full-text available
In this study, we determined the levels of elements (i.e. As, Be, Cd, Cr, Hg, Ni, Pb, U, and Zn) in bees and edible beehive products (honey, wax, pollen, and propolis) sampled from five selected sites in the Rome province (Italy). Rationale: to increase the information variety endowment, the monitoring breakdown structure (MBS) conceptual model w...
Preprint
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The RHAPS project was launched in 2019 with the major objective to identify specific properties of the fine atmospheric aerosol from combustion sources that are responsible for toxicological effects and can be used as new metrics for health-related outdoor pollution studies. In this paper, we present the overall methodology of RHAPS, and introduce...
Article
Toxicity of the soluble fraction of particulate matter (PM) has been extensively evaluated, but it has also been demonstrated that insoluble aerosol species can considerably contribute to toxicological potential of PM. However, most of the procedures regarding the assessment of toxicological effects of the whole PM (soluble and insoluble species) r...
Patent
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The device of the invention is a single-module annular contactor that allows the transport of a solute between two liquid phases consisting of a source solution (F) and a receiving solution (R) by means of a liquid membrane solution confined in the compartment with annular geometry made of a pair of coaxial hollow fibers, such that the source solut...
Article
The concentration of air pollutants is governed by both emission rate and atmospheric dispersion conditions. The role played by the atmospheric mixing height in determining the daily time pattern of PM components at the time resolution of 2 h was studied during 21 days of observation selected from a 2-month field campaign carried out in the urban a...
Article
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Water-soluble and insoluble fractions of airborne particulate matter (PM) exhibit different toxicological potentials and peculiar mechanisms of action in biological systems. However, most of the research on the oxidative potential (OP) of PM is focused exclusively on its water-soluble fraction, since experimental criticisms were encountered for det...
Article
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Biogenic fraction of airborne PM10 which includes bacteria, viruses, fungi and pollens, has been proposed as one of the potential causes of the PM10 toxicity. The present study aimed to provide a comprehensive understanding of the microbial community variations associated to PM10, and their main local sources in the surrounding environment in three...
Article
During the national lockdown imposed by Italian government (from March 9th to May 18th 2020) to counter the Covid-19 pandemic, 24-h PM10 samples were collected at three sites in the Rome area (Central Italy), two urban (Sapienza and Via Saredo, highly impacted by vehicular traffic) and one peri-urban (Montelibretti, more impacted by biomass domesti...
Article
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Food product safety and quality are closely related to the elemental composition of food. This study combined multielement analysis and chemometric tools to characterize 237 extra-virgin olive oil (EVOO) samples from 15 regions of Italy, and to verify the possibility of discriminating them according to different quality factors, such as varietal or...
Article
Oxidative potential (OP) has been suggested as a biologically relevant exposure metric for estimating particulate matter (PM) capacity to induce oxidative stress in living organisms. However, standardized experimental procedures are not yet available. This study explores how a variety of operating conditions influences responses of several differen...
Article
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Reusable water bottles are growing in popularity; thus, possible chemical release from the internal surface into water should be carefully considered to control related health risks. We experimentally evaluated the release into deionized water of 40 elements, six phthalates, and bisphenol-A for 20 different reusable bottles by simulating the use in...
Article
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Bees and their products are useful bioindicators of anthropogenic activities and could overcome the deficiencies of air quality networks. Among the environmental contaminants, mercury (Hg) is a toxic metal that can accumulate in living organisms. The first aim of this study was to develop a simple analytical method to determine Hg in small mass sam...
Article
Increased attention has been given to particulate matter (PM) that, as well as worsening air quality, is responsible for chronic and acute respiratory or cardiovascular diseases. Currently, most of the studies are focused on the capacity of plants and other biological media to adsorb PM, whereas few works explore the functional damage due to PM on...
Article
We employed an experimental approach for high spatial resolution sampling and analysis of PM10, allowing identification and spatial mapping of tracers of PM10 emission sources. Very-low-volume samplers were used at 17 sites in Amersfoort and at one regulatory reference site in Utrecht, The Netherlands, in a 5-month monitoring period (from September...
Article
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Urinary concentrations of 16 different exposure biomarkers to metals were determined at the beginning and at the end of a working shift on a group of workers in the metal carpentry industry. Five different oxidative stress biomarkers were also measured, such as the oxidation products of RNA and DNA metabolized and excreted in the urine. The results...
Article
The impact of outdoor and indoor sources on the chemical composition of particulate matter (PM) collected in a domestic environment was explored. PM2.5 samples were simultaneously collected inside (living room and bedroom) and outside a detached house located in a peri-urban area. The daily concentrations of macro-components and of micro- and trace...
Article
Full-text available
The aim of the study was to analyze all powdered infant formulas authorized and commercialized in Italy at the time of the study to measure the concentrations of 40 elements, and to estimate the infants’ intake of some toxic heavy metals for assessing possible related health risks. For this purpose, an optimized multi-element method was used throug...
Article
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We describe a new on-line sensitive and selective procedure for the determination of trivalent and hexavalent chromium in liquid samples by a tailor-made contactor (TMC), specifically a liquid membrane annular TMC, coupled with inductively coupled plasma with optical detection. The TMC was designed and developed to integrate the extraction and stri...
Article
Full-text available
In the VIEPI project (Integrated evaluation of the exposure to indoor particulate matter) framework, we carried out a 1-year study of the concentration and chemical composition of particulate matter (PM) in a 5 story building in the Sapienza University of Rome (Italy). Each sampling had a duration of 1 month and was carried out indoors and outdoors...
Article
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Urinary mercury (Hg) levels are suitable to assess long-term exposure to both elemental and inorganic Hg. In this study, the urinary Hg levels of 250 children (aged 6-11 years) from three areas with different anthropogenic impacts in the Rieti province, central Italy, were assessed. The Hg concentrations were in the range of 0.04-2.18 µg L −1 with...
Article
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Titanium dioxide is produced or imported into the EU for over one million tons/year. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classification is 2B, a possible inhalation carcinogen for humans. This study evaluates urinary biomarkers of oxidative stress in workers of a plant producing TiO 2 pigment powder, having 0.25 µm average partic...
Article
Full-text available
Exposure to outdoor air pollution has been shown to increase asthma symptoms. We assessed the potential role of particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter <2.5 µm (PM 2.5) on respiratory condition in schoolchildren in the south Mediterranean area. A total of 2400 children aged 11-14 years were recruited, and data on their symptoms were collected...
Article
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Despite the progress made in recent years, reliable modeling of indoor air quality is still far from being obtained. This requires better chemical characterization of the pollutants and airflow physics included in forecasting tools, for which field observations conducted simultaneously indoors and outdoors are essential. The project “Integrated Eva...
Article
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Children's development and health may be affected by toxic heavy metal exposure or suboptimal essential element intake. This study aimed to provide updated information regarding the concentrations of 41 elements in children's hair (aged under 18) living in a rural area of the Benishangul-Gumuz region, Ethiopia. The highest average levels (as a geom...
Presentation
Full-text available
Lo stress ossidativo è considerato uno dei principali meccanismi con cui il particolato atmosferico (PM) esercita i suoi effetti negativi sugli organismi viventi (Li et al., 2015). Negli ultimi anni, diversi test acellulari sono stati sviluppati ed utilizzati per valutare il potenziale ossidativo (OP) del PM emesso da diverse sorgenti. Tuttavia, le...
Presentation
I composti organici persistenti (Persistent Organic Pollutants, POPs) sono costituiti da un’eterogenea classe di composti di origine prevalentemente antropica che, a causa delle loro caratteristiche di tossicità e resistenza ai processi di degradazione, sono considerati inquinanti pericolosi per la salute umana e ambientale. I POPs comprendono tra...
Article
Full-text available
Bee health and beehive products’ quality are compromised by complex interactions between multiple stressors, among which toxic elements play an important role. The aim of this study is to optimize and validate sensible and reliable analytical methods for biomonitoring studies and the quality control of beehive products. Four digestion procedures, i...
Article
Full-text available
Bee health and beehive products' quality are compromised by complex interactions between multiple stressors, among which toxic elements play an important role. The aim of this study is to optimize and validate sensible and reliable analytical methods for biomonitoring studies and the quality control of beehive products. Four digestion procedures, i...
Article
Air pollution is recognized as the world’s largest environmental health risk. In this work we evaluated in vivo the effects of three relevant components of atmospheric dusts (brake dust, wood pellet ash and Saharan dust) employing the animal model Caenorhabditis elegans. Main endpoints of C. elegans such as life span, brood size and oxidative stres...
Article
Air pollution is recognized as the world's largest environmental health risk. In this work we evaluated in vivo the effects of three relevant components of atmospheric dusts (brake dust, wood pellet ash and Saharan dust) employing the animal model Caenorhabditis elegans. Main endpoints of C. elegans such as life span, brood size and oxidative stres...
Article
Full-text available
The aim of the study was to evaluate occupational exposure to 40 elements among a group of Eritrean adults employed at the Medeber metal market by analysing human scalp hair samples and by investigating the role of some predictors (gender, age, and body mass index—BMI) on their levels. Scalp hair samples were collected from 60 subjects (32 subjects...
Article
Full-text available
The ability of lichen transplant Evernia prunastri (L.) Ach. to reflect air concentration and spatial distribution of 7 polychlorinated dibenzodioxins (PCDDs), 10 polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDFs), and 23 polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) was evaluated through the construction of a wide and dense biomonitoring network. For this purpose, 23 liche...
Presentation
Full-text available
Recent studies identified the generation of oxidative stress as one of the major mechanisms by which PM exerts its adverse biological effects. The ability of PM to induce oxidative stress is frequently estimated by acellular oxidative potential (OP) assays, such as acid ascorbic (AA), 2,7-dichlorofluorescenin (DCFH) and dithiothreitol (DTT) assay,...
Article
Full-text available
The mass concentration of atmospheric particulate matter (PM) has been systematically used in epidemiological studies as an indicator of exposure to air pollutants, connecting PM concentrations with a wide variety of human health effects. However, these effects can be hardly explained by using one single parameter, especially because PM is formed b...
Preprint
Full-text available
The mass concentration of atmospheric particulate matter (PM) has been systematically used in epidemiological studies as an indicator of exposure to air pollutants, connecting PM concentrations with a wide variety of human health effects. However, these effects can be hardly explained by using one single parameter, especially because PM is formed b...
Article
The ability of particulate matter (PM) to induce oxidative stress is frequently estimated by acellular oxidative potential (OP) assays, such as ascorbic acid (AA) and 1,4-dithiothreitol (DTT), used as proxy of reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation in biological systems, and particle-bound ROS measurement, such as 2',7'-dichlorodihydrofluorescein...
Article
In this source apportionment study, an original approach based on receptor modelling was tested to relate primary and secondary organic aerosol (OA) contributions - estimated from ACSM (Aerosol Chemical Speciation Monitor) measurements - to their emission sources. Moreover, thanks to the coupling of optical and chemical variables as input to the re...
Article
In line with the Circular Economy approach, the production of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) with organic waste as the feedstock may a biotechnological application to reduce waste and recover high-value materials. The potential contaminants that could transfer from bio-waste to a PHA include inorganic elements, such as heavy metals. Hence, the total co...
Article
The ability of transplanted lichen Evernia (E.) prunastri (L.) to act as a high spatial biomonitoring tool for 14 polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) was evaluated at 23 monitoring sites in a very polluted area in central Italy. The selected area is characterized by the presence of numerous emission sources, such as waste-to-energy plant, steel...