Biomarkers and Health Risks of 1,3-Butadiene Exposure

1,3-Butadiene is a high-volume petrochemical and ubiquitous environmental pollutant recognised as a human carcinogen. Occupational exposures occur in the manufacture of synthetic rubber and related products, while ambient exposure arises chiefly from vehicle exhaust and tobacco smoke. Upon inhalation, butadiene undergoes metabolic activation to reactive epoxide intermediates that form DNA and protein adducts, perturb epigenetic regulation and induce genotoxic effects. Urinary mercapturic acids and haemoglobin adducts serve as quantitative biomarkers, linking external air concentrations to internal doses and enabling the characterisation of exposure kinetics. Biomarker half-lives and accumulation patterns inform the selection of appropriate monitoring strategies, distinguishing recent from cumulative exposures. Epidemiological evidence has consistently associated butadiene exposure with lymphohematopoietic malignancies, while emerging data point to cardiovascular, reproductive and developmental impacts. Advances in dosimetric modelling, risk assessment and reference-value derivation have refined non-cancer and cancer risk benchmarks, supporting regulatory measures to protect workers and the general population. Global efforts to reduce emissions and strengthen biomonitoring frameworks underscore the ongoing need for integrated toxicological, epidemiological and biomarker research to mitigate the public health burden of butadiene.

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Biomarkers and Health Risks of 1,3-Butadiene Exposure publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in biomarkers and health risks of 1,3-butadiene exposure across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Mercapturic acids: Urinary metabolites formed by conjugation of reactive epoxides with glutathione, used as biomarkers of recent butadiene exposure.

Haemoglobin adducts: Covalent modifications of haemoglobin by reactive metabolites, serving as cumulative internal-dose markers over the erythrocyte lifespan.

Reference value (RfV): An inhalation exposure concentration below which non-cancer health effects are unlikely, derived from animal or human data with appropriate uncertainty factors.

Unit risk: The estimated upper-bound lifetime cancer risk per unit air concentration of a carcinogen, used to quantify cancer hazard.

Internal dose: The concentration or amount of a chemical or its metabolites reaching target tissues, inferred from biomarker measurements.

References

1. Kinetic Considerations in the Interpretation of Biomonitoring of 1,3-Butadiene Exposure by Determination of Urinary Mercapturic Acids. Toxics (2024).
2. 1,3-Butadiene: a ubiquitous environmental mutagen and its associations with diseases. Genes and Environment (2022).
3. Epigenetic Alterations in Liver of C57BL/6J Mice after Short-Term Inhalational Exposure to 1,3-Butadiene. Environmental Health Perspectives (2010).
4. 1,3-Butadiene metabolite 1,2,3,4 diepoxybutane induces DNA adducts and micronuclei but not t(9;22) translocations in human cells. Chemico-Biological Interactions (2019).
5. Use of biomarker data and metabolite relative potencies to support derivation of noncancer reference values based on the reproductive and developmental toxicity effects of 1,3-butadiene. Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology (2022).
6. Use of Biomarker Data and Relative Potencies of Mutagenic Metabolites to Support Derivation of Cancer Unit Risk Values for 1,3-Butadiene from Rodent Tumor Data. Toxics (2022).