Allergy Asthma Immunol Res. 2019 Jul;11(4):450-469 https://doi.org/10.4168/aair.2019.11.4.450 pISSN 2092-7355·eISSN 2092-7363 Review House Dust Mite Allergy Under Changing Environments Nathalie Acevedo , Josefina Zakzuk , Luis Caraballo * Institute for Immunological Research, University of Cartagena, Cartagena de Indias, Colombia Received: Feb 28, 2019 ABSTRACT Revised: Mar 12, 2019 Accepted: Mar 15, 2019 Environmental variations induced by industrialization and climate change partially explain the Correspondence to increase in prevalence and severity of allergic disease. One possible mechanism is the increase Luis Caraballo, MD, PhD in allergen production leading to more exposure and sensitization in susceptible individuals. Institute for Immunological Research, House dust mites (HDMs) are important sources of allergens inducing asthma and rhinitis, University of Cartagena, Cra. 5 #7-77, Cartagena 130014, Colombia. and experimentally they have been demonstrated to be very sensitive to microenvironment Tel: +57-310-352-7373 modifications; therefore, global or regional changes in temperature, humidity, air pollution Fax: +57-669-8496 or other environmental conditions could modify natural HDM growth, survival and allergen E-mail:
[email protected] production. There is evidence that sensitization to HDMs has increased in some regions of the world, especially in the subtropical and tropical areas; however, the relationship of this increase Copyright © 2019 The Korean Academy of Asthma, Allergy and Clinical Immunology • with environmental changes is not so clear as has reported for pollen allergens. In this review, The Korean Academy of Pediatric Allergy and we address this point and explore the effects of current and predicted environmental changes Respiratory Disease on HDM growth, survival and allergen production, which could lead to immunoglobulin E This is an Open Access article distributed (IgE) sensitization and allergic disease prevalence.