Volatile organic compounds exposure, biological ageing, and increased sarcopenia risk: Association, interaction, and mechanistic exploration.

Evidence on the impacts of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), a class of ubiquitous environmental toxics, on sarcopenia, a major age-related global health issue, remains scarce. Data from 3007 adults in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2011-2018) were analyzed to assess the individual and mixture effects of 16 VOCs metabolites (VOCMs) on sarcopenia using multivariate logistic regression, weighted quantile sum (WQS), and Bayesian kernel machine regression (BKMR) models.

Network pharmacology was employed to explore potential underlying mechanisms. The phenotypic age (PhenoAge), a biomarker of biological ageing, was used to evaluate its interaction with VOCMs.

Several VOCMs, including 2-aminothiazoline-4-carboxylic acid (ATCA; odds ratio: 1.30, 95 % confidence interval: 1.07-1.57), N-acetyl-S-(2-carboxyethyl)-l-cysteine (CEMA; 1.40, 1.01-1.94), N-acetyl-S-(3,4-dihydroxybutyl)-l-cysteine (DHBMA; 2.35, 1.45-3.82), and 3-methylhippuric acid & 4-methylhippuric acid (3,4MHA; 1.32, 1.05-1.64), were associated with an increased risk of sarcopenia. The mixture of 16 VOCMs was linked to a higher sarcopenia risk in both BKMR and WQS (1.79, 1.30-2.49) models.

The tumor necrosis factor (TNF) signaling pathway was identified as a key mechanism underlying the VOCs-sarcopenia relationship. PhenoAge was associated with an elevated sarcopenia risk (1.05, 1.01-1.09) and intensified the adverse effects of VOCMs (P interaction<0.05).

This study is the first to demonstrate that VOCs exposure, in interaction with biological ageing, may elevate sarcopenia risk, potentially through the TNF signaling pathway, offering novel insights into sarcopenia prevention in the context of VOCs exposure.