Assessment of biological effects under the conditions of combined exposure to harmful production factors

Abstract

Introduction. The current state of the industrial environment is represented by various combinations of production factors that can negatively affect a person in the production process. The problem with this issue is that currently, there are no algorithms for determining which of the factors makes a greater contribution to the formation of the corresponding reaction of the organism to the combined influence of factors and which patterns of the corresponding reaction of the organism may occur. At the same time, the knowledge of such regularities is an important task for occupational medicine in terms of the analysis of occupational conditions and the state of health of the working staff. The aim of the study was to establish the changes of an animal organism under the simultaneous exposure to electromagnetic radiation (EMR) and moderately low temperature (MLT) and to determine the contribution of each factor to the overall biological effect using mathematical analysis. Materials and methods of research. The biological effects of the combined influence of EMR and MLT in an experiment on laboratory animals (male rats) were investigated. Biochemical parameters were determined, in particular, the state of peroxidation, antioxidant protection, lipid and carbohydrate metabolism, the status of trace elements and immunological reactivity in terms of cellular and humoral links, reproductive function. The proposed mathematical approach based on artificial intelligence was used (fuzzy membership level) to determine the intensity of EMR and MLT under the combined influence of these factors and to establish the most informative indices using factor analysis (principal components analysis). Results. The results showed that, under the combined influence of factors, the biological effects were manifested by the following phenomena: morphological changes in the organs of internal secretion (EMR and MLT with the equal degree of contribution = 0.50), increased peroxidation with simultaneous moderate inhibition of antioxidant protection, increased lipid metabolism with dyslipoprotein phenomena (degree of contribution for MLT was 0.67, degree of contribution for EMR was 0.33). As for the immune system, phase changes in the work of both cellular and humoral units (degree of contribution for EMR was 0.53, degree of contribution for MLT was 0.47), disorders in the functioning of sperm (degree of contribution for EMR was 0.55, degree of contribution for MLT was = 0.45) were revealed. Conclusions. The method of determining the intensity of the impact allowed to reveal that each of the factors had its share of contribution to the studied systems. According to the general calculations, the largest contribution was made by MLT, which added 54 % of its contribution to the overall biological effect against EMR, for which the share of the contribution was only 46 %. Such an analysis made it possible to predict the likely response of the whole organism and to develop reasonably appropriate preventive measures.