Kimberly Jessup Swanson - MSPH Technical Report Final Defense

Biodiesel, an alkyl ester of plant oils which can be used in an unmodified diesel engine, is the first renewable diesel fuel alternative to show signs of becoming a commercially accepted part of our nation’s energy infrastructure. For traditional diesel fuel, it has been demonstrated that the particulate matter (PM) organic components play a role in acute inflammatory reactions. However, the literature offers only a few cytotoxicity and mutagenicity studies on biodiesel emissions. There has been no acute health effects research to date which provides clear and substantiated evidence that exposure to the organic fraction of biodiesel exhaust induces lung effects different from the effects produced by petroleum diesel.

In this work, BEAS-2B, a transformed human airway epithelial cell line, was exposed in vitro to the particulate matter organic extracts from Standard Reference Material (SRM) 1975, soy ethyl ester (SEE), soy methyl ester (SME), and petroleum diesel for 24 hours. This study demonstrated that the organic extracts of biodiesel PM in an aqueous solution can modulate the release of proinflammatory proteins by epithelial cells. The biodiesel extracts appear to be a more potent inflammatory stimulant compared to the organic extracts of two diesel PM samples on a Committee Members:
Andrew J. Ghio, MD, Research Advisor
Louise M. Ball, PhD, Academic Advisor
Leena Nylander-French, PhD, Reader

For further information please contact Rebecca Riggsbee Lloyd by email at Rebecca_Lloyd@unc.edu