New Nature Health Publication Co-Authored by Dr. Eric Deharo

HKU–Pasteur Research Pole is pleased to highlight a new publication co-authored by Dr. Eric Deharo, Co-Director of the Pole, in Nature Health:

Honles, J., Cerapio, J.P., Monge, C. et al. Mapping pesticide mixtures to cancer risk at the country scale with spatial exposomics. Nature Health (2026).

Published on 1 April 2026, this study led by Stephane BERTANI proposes a new framework for understanding how environmental pesticide exposure may contribute to cancer risk in real-world settings.

Bringing together environmental modelling, spatial epidemiology and molecular analysis, the research focuses on Peru and combines a high-resolution pesticide exposure model with national cancer registry data to identify clusters of cancers associated with pesticide risk. The authors write that their work reveals “a robust spatial association between environmental pesticide exposure risk and cancer incidence.”

A major strength of the study lies in its integrative methodology. The researchers developed a process-based environmental model covering 31 of the most commonly used pesticide active ingredients in Peru and mapped exposure risk at 100 m × 100 m resolution across the country. This fine-scale modelling was then linked to a large dataset of 158,072 primary cancer cases, allowing the team to identify pesticide-associated cancer hotspots with unprecedented spatial precision.

The study also moves beyond conventional organ-based classifications of cancer. Instead, it stratifies cancers according to developmental lineage, an approach that helps reveal shared biological vulnerabilities across tumour types. This lineage-informed framework enabled the identification of 436 hotspots across Peru, suggesting that the relationship between pesticide exposure and cancer may follow broader developmental and molecular patterns than previously appreciated.

Among the most striking findings is the evidence related to liver cancer, a major target of chemical carcinogens. In pesticide-associated hotspots, exposomic profiling of liver tissue revealed a distinct transcriptomic signature consistent with exposure to non-genotoxic carcinogens. Rather than directly damaging DNA, such agents may promote carcinogenesis by disrupting the regulatory systems that maintain normal cell identity. As the authors explain, these findings point to “a mechanistic link between pesticide exposure and cancer” and challenge assumptions derived from more reductionist toxicological models.

The article also raises important questions for public health and environmental justice. The mapped hotspots were frequently located in rural areas under strong agricultural pressure, including Andean–Amazonian regions where Indigenous and peasant communities may face disproportionate exposure burdens. In that sense, the study does not only advance cancer epidemiology: it also contributes to broader debates on global health policy, environmental exposure, and socio-ecological equity.

More broadly, this publication illustrates the value of interdisciplinary and international collaboration in addressing complex health challenges. By integrating environmental sciences, geostatistics, oncology and transcriptomics, the study offers a scalable framework that could inform environmental health assessments well beyond Peru.

Dr. Eric Deharo’s contribution to this work reflects HKU–Pasteur Research Pole’s continued commitment to impactful, globally relevant research at the intersection of health, environment and translational science.

Link of the article : http://nature.com/articles/s44360-026-00087-0