Association between traffic-related air pollution and brain morphology, assessing the olfactory pathway as a mediator
Margarethe Woeckel, Susanne Rospleszcz, Gizem Abaci, Maximilian Schwarz, Susanne Breitner-Busch, Fabian Bamberg, Michael Ingrisch, Christopher L Schlett, Kathrin Wolf, Alexandra Schneider, Sophia Stoecklein, Annette Peters · 2026
Read Association between traffic-related air pollution and brain morphology, assessing the olfactory pathway as a mediator by Margarethe Woeckel, Susanne Rospleszcz, Gizem Abaci, Maximilian Schwarz, Susanne Breitner-Busch, Fabian Bamberg, Michael Ingrisch, Christopher L Schlett, Kathrin Wolf, Alexandra Schneider, Sophia Stoecklein, Annette Peters (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/PMC13281947.txt.
Description
Margarethe Woeckel and colleagues linked traffic fumes to brain change in a 2026 study. Long exposure to road fumes is a known health risk. Germs of the idea hold that fumes may reach the brain along the smell nerve. The team used head scans from a population study in Augsburg, Germany. Four hundred adults, averaging fifty-six years, were scanned. Models estimated each home's long-term fume load. Scans read white matter scars, tiny bleeds, brain sizes, and the smell bulb's glow.
Higher fume loads went with higher odds of white matter scars. The link held for soot-dark particles and showed in most brain zones. Rear zones also tied to nitrogen gas and coarse dust. The team then tested whether the smell bulb carried the fume effect to the wider brain. The bulb is treated as a suspect bridge. The authors say fumes mark the aging brain.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Margarethe Woeckel, Susanne Rospleszcz, Gizem Abaci, Maximilian Schwarz, Susanne Breitner-Busch, Fabian Bamberg, Michael Ingrisch, Christopher L Schlett, Kathrin Wolf, Alexandra Schneider, Sophia Stoecklein, Annette Peters |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 42869 |
| LICENSE | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |