Impact of atmospheric fine particles on female reproductive health

Research on the health hazards of atmospheric particulate (PM2.5) pollutants has become a hot topic in the public and science community. There are a lot of researches on the respiratory and cardiovascular impacts of PM2.5. However, the literature regarding PM2.5 and female reproductive health are limited, and revealed that PM2.5 exposure might cause female fertility decrease, reproductive system damage, and a variety of adverse pregnancy outcomes (including miscarriage, premature birth, low birth weight and placental weight) in the epidemiology studies and animal experiments. Its action mechanism hypothesis included the inflammatory mediators hypothesis, the oxidative injury hypothesis, and the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis hypothesis. Based on the literatures on the female reproductive hazards of PM2.5 in recent ten years, the present article summarized the research progress in this field and provide references for further research on female reproductive toxicity of PM2.5 in the future. Key words: Atmospheric particulate; Female; Reproductive health