With the increasing of the level of pollution in the international hemisphere there has been an extensive impetus in the organizing of global summits and investigative studies, to get an apparent diction of the perilous affect in the coming years on the human civilization. In this regard, it has come to the knowledge that one of the prime reasons of the worsening health conditions high cholesterol may affect from air pollution. The significance of a recent study undertaken by the ULCA in this direction connects diesel exhaust to atherosclerosis or hardening of the arteries that in its turn increases the risk for heart attack and stroke vehemently. It has been confirmed in this regard, that these findings happen to be the first to explain in a detailed manner the operation of the fine particles in air pollution with artery-clogging fats to activate the genes that results into blood vessel inflammation and therefore lead to cardiovascular disease.

While being enquired investigator Dr. André Nel, the principal investigator and chief of nanomedicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a researcher at UCLA's California NanoSystems Institute said, "When you add one plus one, it normally totals two. But we found that adding diesel particles to cholesterol fats equals three. Their combination creates a dangerous synergy that wreaks cardiovascular havoc far beyond what's caused by the diesel or cholesterol alone."

According to him, the group of researchers were able to establish a comprehensive scenario for the investigation of the saga of communication or interaction between the particles of the diesel exhaust and the fatty acids that are found in the low-density lipoprotein or LDL type of cholesterol, known as the "bad" type of cholesterol that ultimately proceeds to artery blockage. Above all, the entire team was primarily interested in the very process how oxidation or the cell and tissue damage resulting from exposure to molecules known as free radicals makes a definite contribution to the gradual inflammation and also the artery disease. To them the free radicals enter the body through the small particles that are present in polluted air, and is the consequence of normal processes, for instance the metabolic conversion of food into energy. As apart of the study the scientists through the combining of the pollutants and oxidized fats refined them with the cells from the inner lining of human blood vessels. It was after a few hours that the DNA from the cells for genetic analysis was extracted.   In addition, for the replication of these findings in living cells, the UCLA team exposed mice with high cholesterol to the diesel particles and as a result activation of some of the same gene groups in the animals' tissue were perceived.  

To conclude, Dr. Jesus Araujo, UCLA assistant professor of medicine and director of environmental cardiology at the Geffen School of Medicine said, "The interaction left a genetic footprint that reveals how interaction between the particles and cholesterol accelerates the narrowing and blockage of the blood vessels."