Polycyclic Aromatic Compounds

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Health Risk Assessment from Polycyclic Aromatic

Hydrocarbons (PAHs) Present in Dietary
Components: A Meta-analysis on a Global Scale

Abhrajyoti Tarafdar, Shruti Chawda & Alok Sinha

To cite this article: Abhrajyoti Tarafdar, Shruti Chawda & Alok Sinha (2018): Health
Risk Assessment from Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) Present in Dietary
Components: A Meta-analysis on a Global Scale, Polycyclic Aromatic Compounds, DOI:
10.1080/10406638.2018.1492426

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10406638.2018.1492426

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POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC COMPOUNDS
https://doi.org/10.1080/10406638.2018.1492426

Health Risk Assessment from Polycyclic Aromatic

Hydrocarbons (PAHs) Present in Dietary Components: A
Meta-analysis on a Global Scale
Abhrajyoti Tarafdara , Shruti Chawdab, and Alok Sinhac
a
Division of Environmental Science and Ecological Engineering, Korea University, Republic of Korea;
b
Department of Environment, Headquarters, Western Coalfields Ltd, Nagpur, India; cDepartment of
Environmental Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Dhanbad

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

A carcinogenic risk assessment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) Received 30 June 2017
in dietary components was conducted using probabilistic approach from a Accepted 14 June 2018
global perspective. Published monitoring data of PAHs present in foods at
KEYWORDS
different study points across the world were reviewed and collected as
Cancer risk; food; monte
their corresponding BaPeq concentrations. These BaPeq concentrations were carlo; PAHs; risk analysis
used to evaluate comprehensive cancer risk for two different age groups
(children and adults). Monte Carlo simulation and sensitivity analysis were
applied to quantify uncertainties of risk estimation. 95% risk values for
food PAHs varies between 5.36E-07 to 1.97E-03 for children and 6.44E-07
to 4.56E-03 for adults. Overall carcinogenic risks of PAHs in food samples
from all over the world were mostly in acceptance limits. However, diag-
nostic ratio analysis confirmed that PAHs contribution by some cooking
process like grilling/smoking and industrial/vehicular pollution can respect-
ively affect cooked foods and raw agricultural products. Sensitivity analysis
reveals exposure duration (contribution: 45.3% for Children & 54.7% for
adults) and food ingestion rate per unit of body mass (contribution: 40.2%
for children and 28.5% for adults) as the most influential parameter of the
assessment, followed by cancer slope factor for ingestion of BaP. Some
specific locations like Prince Island, Tianjin Province and Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa Province demand potential strategies of carcinogenic risk
management and reduction. The current study is the probable first
attempt to provide summed up information on carcinogenic risk of PAHs
in dietary components on a global scale.

1. Introduction
Processing procedures, such as smoking and drying, and cooking of food is commonly thought
to be the major source of contamination of dietary components by polycyclic aromatic hydrocar-
bons (PAHs). Cooking results in the production in the food of a number of compounds including
PAHs depending on several parameters like time, fuel used, distance from the heat source, tem-
perature and drainage of fat type (grilling, frying, roasting, smoking)1–3. An individual may con-
sume levels as high as 200 lg of individual PAH with consumption of single kg of smoked fish

CONTACT Abhrajyoti Tarafdar abhra@outlook.com Division of Environmental Science and Ecological Engineering, Korea
University, Republic of Korea.
Color versions of one or more of the figures in the article can be found online at www.tandfonline.com/gpol.
Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s here.
ß 2018 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
2 A. TARAFDAR ET AL.

and meat. In barbecued meat, 130 lg/kg has been reported whereas, the average background val-
ues are usually in the range of 0.01-1 lg/kg in uncooked foods4.
Artificial drying of vegetables, seeds and kernels for production of oils also leads to contamin-
ation of vegetable oils with PAHs. Artificial drying includes technological processes like direct fire
drying, where combustion products comes into contact with the oil seeds or oil5. Raw foods should
usually not contain high levels of PAHs. The remote areas or in areas away from urban and indus-
trial areas the unprocessed food (raw vegetables and meat) gets contaminated by PAHs which are
result of long distance airborne transportation of contaminated particles and natural emissions
from volcanoes and forest fires. Whereas, the regions just next to industrial areas or along the high-
ways shows the contamination of vegetation ten-fold higher than that in rural areas6.
PAHs have been shown to cause carcinogenic and mutagenic effects and are potent immune
suppressants. Oncogenic, teratogenic effects, genotoxicity, an increased level of cholesterol in the
blood or reproduction defects, biochemical disruption and cell damage were observed after long-
term PAHs exposure and confirmed by toxicological experiments7,8. Due to their mutagenic, car-
cinogenic and teratogenic potencies on human health, this group of ubiquitously distributed fused
aromatic compounds have attracted particular concern and 16 PAHs were listed as priority pollu-
tant9,10. The International Agency for Research on Cancer considered some PAHs as potential
human carcinogens, as short and long-term exposure to PAHs in laboratory experiments caused
harmful mutagenic health effects of animals on skin, lung, liver, urinary tract, hematopoietic,
neurological, immune and reproductive system11,12.
There are numerous studies on PAHs profiling in foods but, as per our concern, no prominent
study has been conducted on summing up the potential cancer risk on the PAHs present in foods
at a global scale. The current study is a meta-analysis on the potential cancer risk assessment by
Monte-Carlo simulation of PAHs present in dietary components worldwide.

2. Methodology
2.1. Formulation of PAHs problem in dietary components worldwide
The steps for human health risk assessment include data collection and analysis, toxicity analysis,
exposure assessment and risk simulation13. Published PAHs monitoring data of dietary compo-
nents from different city/provinces throughout the world were collected and shown in Table 1.
We took the arithmetic mean of each individual PAHs concentration at different reports of a par-
ticular country. Among all of the PAHs, BaP have the highest carcinogenicity and thus mutage-
nicity of PAHs are given in terms of BaP equivalent (BaPeq). Potency equivalence factors (PEFs)
have been used to express the relative carcinogenic potency of each PAH compared to BaP14.
X
Total BaPeq ¼ Ci  PEFi (1)
i

where, Ci is the concentration of individual PAH and PEFi is the corresponding toxic equiva-
lency factor.
To maintain unit consistency, the concentration values were converted into mg kg1 in this
study. The mean PAHs concentrations at each sampling point from the different study were cal-
culated to produce more accurate risk estimations. An important hypothesis for this study was
that concentrations of PAHs directly obtained from the literatures represented the contaminant
status of different study point, and the differences in data quality were not considered13. The
USEPA, (2003)10 enlisted 16 priority pollutant PAHs were taken in concern where, provided con-
centration of PAHs beyond this list by some studies were not considered. Potency Equivalency
Factors (PEFs) were used to convert PAH levels to BaP equivalents for assessment of carcinogenic
risk .
 POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC COMPOUNDS 3

Table 1. Consumption of PAHs in different city/provinces throughout the world with different dietaries and BaPeq. Detailed
source data provided in supplementary file (Table S3).
City/ Total PAHs (Mean)
Province, Country Food items Sample Count (mg kg-1) Total BaPeq References
Catalonia, Spain cooked meat 24  4 25.515 0.359064 15
processed fish 24  4 7.95 0.35373
vegetables 24  4 1.6115 0.062096
fatty food 24  4 23.536 1.22932
bakery food 24  4 14.365 0.1927
Porto, Portugal grilled beef 6 45.755 0.711305 1
grilled salmon 6 145.405 4.982995
Zarzouna, Tunisia sea food 30  5 212.7097 3.3098887 16
Zabrze and bread 92 23.0502 0.077961 17,18
Warsaw, Poland cooked meat 23 15.39 0.91296
London, UK beef burgers 256 72 17.7534 19
Taipei, Taiwan and vegetables 82 2308.492 209.510839 20
Tianjin, China smoked duck 10 206.3 12.0701
grilled duck 12 298.3 7.8772
Dobrogea vegetables 10 428.2945 1.1303305 23
region, Romania
European grilled meat 3 515.83 84.86005 24
Commission smoked fish 35 þ 27 þ 58 109.944 2.97342
report, Europe mussels 3 þ 3þ12 34.264 4.727629
vegetables 16 þ 20 þ 2 þ 3 344.0371 5.8937935
fruits 2 23.7375 0.76455
cereals 10 þ 6þ10 þ 1þ3 þ19 þ 10 þ 10 66.2238 1.487205
Okayama, Japan dried hijiki 8 167.2 9.9583 25
dried bonito 1862.4 17.1237
dried shittake 603.2 8.5484
Gulf of Catania, haliotis 20  3 108.967 11.142616 26
Messina and
S.Giovanni, Italy
Mumbai, India vegetables 6 120.029 2.74757 27
fruits 6 36.117 0.54189
Selangor, Malaysia grilled meat 9 25.395 2.11362 28
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa vegetables 309 298.01 15.89789 29
province, Pakistan
Eastern Province, vegetables 355 9.721 1.82314 30
Saudi Arabia
Cape Coast, Ghana grilled fishes 36  3 839.93 31.12511 31
Gulf of mussels 6 88.06 1.49044 32
Rijeka, Croatia
Prince Islands and mussels 7 4194.058 1098.446107 33,34
Manisa, Turkey meat 6 115.3 0.1153
Karaj, Iran smoked fish 5 20.12 3.15248 35

The assessment models recommended by the Risk Assessment Guidance of USEPA, (1989)36
were used to characterize the cancer risk of the study locations. Current study is believed to be
the first attempt to review the exposure concentration of PAHs in dietary components across the
globe and their corresponding cancer risks were estimated by Monte Carlo simulation.

2.2. Exposure and cancer risk assessment

The possibility of exposure to carcinogen or mutagen denotes the probability of cancer occur-
rence in human body37. The current study is a meta-analysis on the published PAHs data from
dietary components, i.e., an exposure analysis on the determined PAHs concentrations in food at
a global scale. Exposure estimates were performed for two different age groups – children and
adults. Intake values for different food types, suggested by USEPA (2011)38, were used for the
assessment. A single meal per day consisting of the particular food items were considered
4 A. TARAFDAR ET AL.

throughout the year. Consumers-only exposure factor recommendations were taken into account
which is particularly appropriate for the non-veg food intake data. Incase of the assessment of
risk for composite dietary basket, simply the simulated risk factors for different food components
can be summed up to investigate risk based on the total intake.
The Incremental Lifetime Cancer Risk (ILCR) model36 was used to calculate the risk of popu-
lation exposed to PAHs in diet.
Total Risk from PAHs intake via food,
IR  CS  EF  ED  CSF  CF
Rf ¼ (2)
AT
where,
IR is ingestion rate per unit of body mass (g/kg-day), CS stands for total BaPeq concentration in
a particular food (lg/kg), EF is the abbreviation of exposure frequency (350 meals/year), ED is
exposure duration (years), CSF is the cancer slope factor for ingestion of BaP, CF stands for con-
version factor (1  106) and AT is average lifetime for carcinogens time (365 day/year
 70 years).
Exposure factors are related to human behavior and characteristics that help determine an
individual’s exposure to an agent38 are given in Table 2.
R value greater than 106 is unsuitable on the authority of USEPA42. In the opinion of New
York State Department of Health, Qualitative descriptions of lifetime cancer risks are as follows:
very low when the estimated value is 106; low from 106< to <104, moderate from 104
to <103, high from 103 to <101 and very high when the value is 10143.

2.3. Sensitivity and uncertainty analysis

Results of risk assessment tends to be more uncertain due to variability in human behavior and
characteristics44. If these variations are included in risk assessment, then acquired results will give
more realistic view about the distribution of risk39. To calculate the risk and to minimize the uncer-
tainties associated with risk estimation, we have applied Monte Carlo simulation using Crystal Ball
(11.1.2.4.600) software from oracle. The simulation selects a random value of each variable parame-
ters following their provided distributions to calculate the cancer risk. The simulation runs itself for
performing at least 50,000 iterations. To determine the input variables that most affect the cancer
risk assessment, a sensitivity analysis was performed by using Spearman rank correlations13,40.

3. Result and discussion

3.1. Status of PAHs
Concentrations of total PAHs in dietary components across the world vary widely with a large
range of 1.26 – 4135.20 mg kg1 (mean values). Among all the study areas, total PAHs content of
Table 2. Parameter values used for simulation [LN(geomean, stdev)].
Definition Units Distributions Children Adults References
IRfruits g/kg-day Log-normal LN(4.523, 2.357) LN(1.219, 1.1196) 38
IRveg LN(4.910, 1.551) LN(2.463, 1.064)
IRfish LN(1.210, 1.390) LN(0.663, 1.023)1
IRmeat LN(3.157, 1.340) LN(1.714, 1.201)
IRfat LN(3.779, 1.776) LN(0.925, 1.174)
IRgrains LN(4.715, 1.469) LN(2.0785, 1.196)
IRshellfish LN(0.739, 1.399) LN(0.540, 1.270)
AT day Log-normal LN(2196, 1.08) LN(3067, 1.06) 39
ED a Uniform U(0, 11) U(0, 52) 40
CSFingestion mg kg1 d1 Log-normal LN(7.3, 1.56) 41
 POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC COMPOUNDS 5

the Mytilus galloprovincialis mussels from Prince Islands, Turkey have the highest concentration
of PAHs. Longtime pollution caused by intensive domestic tourism and boat traffic owing to con-
struction activities are the probable reasons behind this much PAHs concentration34. Prince
Island was followed by Tianjin, China. Prominent wastewater irrigation and huge quantity of coal
as major fuel are apparently most important reasons for the high level of PAHs in Tianjin21. Fig.
1 shows the concentration of individual PAHs in all food samples reported worldwide.
The process producing the PAHs in a source directly effects the profile45. Various diagnostic
ratios are there to tress the origin (i.e., petrogenic or pyrolytic/combustion) of the PAHs present
in the contaminant. The petrogenic or fossil fuel origin of the PAHs can be determined with a
value of <0.2 for BaA/(BaA þ Chry), a value of <0.1 for Ant/(Ant þ Phe) and a value of <0.5 for
Fla/(Fla þ Pyr). Again, >0.2 for BaA/(BaA þ Chry), a > 0.1 value of Ant/(Ant þ Phe) and a value
of >0.5 for Fla/(Fla þ Pyr) indicates the pyrogenic or coal/organic matter combustion origin of
the present PAHs46–48 (Supplementary data: Table S1).
The average value of the BaA/(BaA þ Chr) ratio is 0.467, which clearly suggests pyrogenic ori-
gin of PAHs in food components. Again, an average value of 0.262 for Ant/(Ant þ Phe) and an
average value of 0.53 Fla/(Fla þ Pyr) supports biomass or coal combustion origin of the PAHs in
foods. These ratios confirm the theory of PAHs generation in food by cooking process (grilling/
barbequing on coal, smoking, roasting etc.). Few obtained diagnostic ratio values of petrogenic
origin are from the raw foods (Spain vegetables, Tunisia mussels, Europe mussels-vegetables, Italy
haliotis, Pakistan vegetables, Turkey mussels etc.). The radar plot (Fig. 2) depicts all the ratio val-
ues and supplementary data (Table S2) includes the value of the diagnostic ratios.
The calculated corresponding BaPeq values of categorized food components are reported in
Fig. 3.

Figure 1. Distribution of individual PAHs in different dietary components at a global scale represented in box and whiskers plot
in logarithmic scale base 10. Each box represents the lower and upper quartile, the band within the box represented the median
value while whiskers represent the minimum and maximum values.
6 A. TARAFDAR ET AL.

3.2. Health risk assessment

Considering the various characteristics of two age groups, the lifetime exposure to PAHs and the
incremental lifetime cancer risk (ILCR) were assessed using equation (1) & (2). Monte Carlo
simulation was used to evaluate uncertainties of the output risk at 95% confidence level. Mean
cancer risk values in terms of PAHs present in different countries for major food product groups
are shown in Fig. 4 for the ease of comparison.
95% risk values for food PAHs are varied between 5.36E-07 to 1.97E-03 for children and
6.44E-07 to 4.56E-03 for adults. All the probability density functions of predicted cancer risks are
provided in supplementary data (Fig. S1). On an average, grilled, fried, smoked foods and raw
foods collected from heavily polluted sites possess greater cancer risk. Contaminated fruits and
fat oils impose greater risk on children than that of the adults. The reason is greater ingestion
rate per unit of body mass for this two food components in children. Except for the case of fruits
and oils, overall, adults are more vulnerable than that of the children population. Vegetables from
(Tianjin province) China, mussels from (Prince Island) Turkey and meat in Europe posses’ high-
est risks (one in thousand) in local population. These cases have a simulated risk value greater
than USEPA acceptance limit. They are followed by, vegetables in Pakistan and Europe, processed
meat from China and UK, grilled fish from Ghana. Assessed cancer risks from other foods world-
wide have values mostly in acceptance limit (Table 3).

3.3. Sensitivity and uncertainty of the assessment

A quantitative sensitivity analysis was conducted in form of tornado plots, illustrating the input
parameters ranked by effect on output risk. This information allows us to identify the most influ-
ential factors that drive the outcome of the assessment (Fig. 5).
Exposure duration (ED), have greatest contribution to the total risk with 45.3% contribution
for the case of children and 54.7% for adults. This is the main reason for consistent greater can-
cer risks for adults (except fruits and fatty foods) as ED for children is 11 years and 52 years for

Spain meat
Iran Smoked Fish Spain Fish
Turkey Meat Spain Vegetables

Turkey Mussels Spain Fatty Food

Croatia Mussels Spain Bakery

Ghana Grilled Fish Portugal Beef

Saudi Arabia Vegetables Portugal Salmon

Pakistan Vegetables Tunisia Sea Food

Malaysia Grilled Meat Poland Bread

India Fruits Poland Meat

India Vegetables UK Beef Burger

Italy Haliotis China Vegetables

Japan Shitteke China Smoked Duck

Japan Bonito China Grilled Duck

Japan Hijiki Romania Vegetables BaA/(BaA+Chry)

Europe Cereals Europe Meat Ant/(Ant+Phe)
Europe Fruits
Europe Vegetables
Europe Fish
Europe Mussels Fla/(Fla+Pyr)

Figure 2. Distribution of various diagnostic ratios: the radar plot. A value of >0.2 for BaA/(BaA þ Chry), a value of >0.1for Ant/
(Ant þ Phe) and a value of >0.5 for Fla/(Fla þ Pyr) confirms pyrolytic origin of the PAHs in food.
 POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC COMPOUNDS 7

Figure 3. BaPeq concentrations (mean) in different food types from studied regions across the globe. (Plot in logarithmic scale
base 10).

Figure 4. Simulated mean cancer risk values in terms of PAHs present in individual dietary components. (Plot in logarithmic
scale base 10).

adults. ED is followed by food ingestion rate per unit of body mass (IR) with a contribution per-
centage of 40.2% for children and 28.5% for adults. Slope factor of cancer (CSF) is the third most
important contributor to variance. The sensitivity analysis result is similar to the study by Li
et al. (2016)22. A more precise and well defined probability distribution of ED, IR and CSF can
increase the quality of the assessment effectively.
8 A. TARAFDAR ET AL.

Table 3. Results of cancer risk assessments for the PAHs present in dietary components worldwide.
Children risk Adults risk
Type of food Country 95% 5% Mean Std Dev 95% 5% Mean Std Dev
Fish Europe 2.62E-6 1.67E-7 2.29E-6 4.35E-6 1.42E-05 4.70E-07 5.70E-06 1.02E-05
Iran 6.64E-6 1.80E-7 2.44E-6 4.65E-6 1.49E-05 4.97E-07 5.98E-06 1.07E-05
Japan 3.53E-5 9.53E-7 1.30E-5 2.48E-5 7.97E-05 2.64E-06 3.19E-05 5.71E-05
Ghana 6.57E-5 1.74E-6 2.42E-5 4.63E-5 1.49E-04 4.82E-06 5.98E-05 1.07E-04
Portugal 1.40E-5 2.88E-7 3.84E-6 7.31E-6 2.36E-05 7.91E-07 9.45E-06 1.69E-05
Spain 7.48E-7 2.08E-8 2.76E-7 2.52E-7 1.68E-06 5.54E-08 6.74E-07 1.20E-06
Meat Europe 5.63E-4 1.12E-5 1.89E-4 3.94E-4 1.09E-03 3.32E-05 4.22E-04 7.72E-04
Malaysia 1.37E-5 2.87E-7 4.63E-6 9.61E-6 2.73E-05 8.54E-07 1.06E-05 1.93E-05
Turkey 5.36E-7 1.09E-8 1.80E-7 3.74E-7 6.44E-07 2.02E-08 2.51E-07 4.58E-07
China 6.70E-5 1.33E-6 2.21E-5 4.61E-5 1.54E-04 4.81E-06 6.01E-05 1.10E-04
UK 5.20E-5 1.70E-6 1.75E-5 3.65E-5 1.00E-04 3.13E-06 3.92E-05 7.14E-05
Poland 1.40E-5 4.29E-7 5.42E-6 9.87E-6 2.14E-05 4.30E-07 7.15E-06 1.49E-05
Portugal 4.73E-6 9.61E-8 1.58E-6 3.27E-6 9.11E-06 2.90E-07 3.56E-06 6.48E-06
Spain 2.37E-6 4.82E-8 7.89E-7 1.64E-6 4.61E-06 1.41E-07 1.80E-06 3.28E-06
Vegetables Europe 5.55E-5 1.31E-6 1.94E-5 3.85E-5 1.04E-04 3.47E-06 4.15E-05 7.44E-05
India 2.61E-5 6.12E-7 9.11E-6 1.82E-5 4.83E-05 1.57E-06 1.93E-05 3.46E-05
Japan 3.62E-5 8.99E-7 1.28E-5 2.53E-5 6.87E-05 2.23E-06 2.76E-05 4.96E-05
China 1.97E-3 4.61E-5 6.89E-4 1.37E-3 3.70E-03 1.22E-04 1.48E-03 2.65E-03
Romania 1.05E-5 2.58E-7 3.71E-6 7.35E-6 2.03E-05 6.48E-07 8.05E-06 1.45E-05
Pakistan 1.49E-4 3.40E-6 5.23E-5 1.04E-4 2.83E-04 9.08E-06 1.13E-04 2.03E-04
Saudi Arab 1.70E-5 4.02E-7 5.99E-6 1.19E-5 1.84E-05 6.07E-07 7.37E-06 1.32E-05
Spain 5.84E-7 1.38E-8 2.04E-7 4.04E-7 1.10E-06 3.55E-08 4.38E-07 7.89E-07
Fruits Europe 1.04E-5 1.24E-7 3.03E-6 7.72E-6 6.80E-06 2.13E-07 2.69E-06 4.84E-06
India 7.38E-6 8.25E-8 2.12E-6 5.50E-6 4.74E-06 1.53E-07 1.88E-06 3.40E-06
Mussels, Shellfish and other seafood Europe 6.11E-6 1.68E-7 2.24E-6 4.27E-6 1.99E-05 5.89E-07 7.60E-06 1.40E-05
Croatia 1.92E-6 5.23E-8 7.07E-7 1.35E-6 6.16E-06 1.82E-07 2.37E-06 4.38E-06
Italy 1.44E-5 3.91E-7 5.31E-6 1.01E-5 4.67E-05 1.35E-06 1.78E-05 3.29E-05
Turkey 1.42E-3 3.79E-5 5.22E-4 9.95E-4 4.56E-03 1.35E-04 1.75E-03 3.25E-03
Tunisia 4.30E-6 1.17E-7 1.58E-6 3.01E-6 1.39E-05 4.06E-07 5.30E-06 9.82E-06
Cereals and Grains Europe 1.28E-5 3.21E-7 4.60E-6 8.90E-6 2.29E-05 7.10E-07 8.95E-06 1.63E-05
Japan 3.95E-5 1.01E-6 1.41E-5 2.75E-5 7.07E-05 2.08E-06 2.75E-05 5.03E-05
Poland 1.20E-6 3.69E-8 4.67E-7 8.50E-7 6.73E-06 1.69E-07 2.41E-06 4.68E-06
Spain 1.64E-6 4.16E-8 5.94E-7 1.15E-6 2.97E-06 9.46E-08 1.17E-06 2.12E-06
Fatty Foods Europe 1.91E-5 3.72E-7 6.26E-6 1.34E-5 1.58E-05 4.84E-07 6.21E-06 1.13E-05
Spain 1.01E-5 1.91E-7 3.32E-6 7.06E-6 8.44E-06 2.60E-07 3.31E-06 5.99E-06

Figure 5. Sensitivity analysis of the cancer risk parameters.

In health risk assessments, uncertainties are not avoidable, which comes from the lack of
appropriate knowledge about the parameters affecting the study. Though, we have used Monte
Carlo simulation to minimize uncertainty, still some of it exist in the risk assessment process.
 POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC COMPOUNDS 9

The probability distributions of exposure parameters like different food ingestion rate values
(IR) were calculated from USEPA recommended values. These might not be an exact match to
the global scenario, making them uncertain parameters of the analysis. Detailed studies are also
needed for more refined definitions of the parameters identified by sensitivity analysis.
The TEF (Toxic Equivalent Factor) values were obtained from experiments on animals and
not human, so they vary upon experimenting through different exposure routes. As an example,
we can state that the TEF value used in this study for Dibenz(a,h)anthracene is 1.014. This value
can underrate the true carcinogenic influence of this compound in the assessment, as another
study claims a TEF of 5.0 for environmental exposures49. Again, certain amount of uncertainty
always associates with evaluation of the toxicity of PAHs because of the infinite number of pos-
sible PAH mixtures and limited dose-response data on carcinogenicity40.
The PAH concentrations of this study were obtained from different studies at different labora-
tory. We have hypothesized that differences in data quality associated with different sampling
techniques, PAHs extraction procedures and quantification studies were not considered. But this
might not be the actual case, which contributes a good amount uncertainty to the assessment.

4. Conclusion
Cancer risk assessment by Monte Carlo simulation has been conducted for published PAHs mon-
itoring data from dietary components across the world. Grilled, fried, smoked food PAHs con-
tents are consistently higher than that of the raw products. Highly polluted agricultural fields
near industries also causes high PAHs in raw vegetables. High population load, transportation
activity and tourism can cause PAHs contamination in seafood. Except few phenomenal cases,
most of the simulated cancer risks are in USEPA acceptance limits. Prince Island of Turkey and
Tianjin province of China are in highly cancer risked zone with cancer risk over 1  103 (one in
thousand) from local foods. Diagnostic ratio analysis confirmed the pyrogenic origin of PAHs in
most of the foods, specially the cooked one, whereas some of the raw foods showed petrogenic/
fossil fuel combustion origin probably due to industrial and vehicular pollution source. Exposure
duration have highest contribution to the simulated output risk and that is the reason behind
overall greater cancer risk for adults from foods. As a bottom line, we can say, grilling and frying
process can be replaced by boiling to avoid excess PAHs generation in food while cooking. This
study also indicated that some special regions like Prince Island (Turkey), Tianjin Province
(China), Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province (Pakistan) should be given special attention, and effective
efforts need to be conducted by the local governments to reduce the adverse effects of PAHs
on residents.

ORCID
Abhrajyoti Tarafdar http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0020-5279

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