Environmental Endocrinology and Endocrine Disruptors


Book Description

This book describes how exposure to various classes of endocrine disruptors, as well as other environmental chemicals targeting the endocrine system by alternative non-endocrine mechanisms, impact on endocrinological and endocrinological-related diseases. It includes comprehensive reviews of all aspects of environmental endocrinology, ranging from sources and patterns of exposure and identification of endocrine targets to direct endocrine disruptive mechanisms and indirect actions on the endocrine system, the latter including endocrine cell-directed cytotoxicity, oxidative damage, and genetic and epigenetic aberrations resulting in endocrine damage. It also examines the causal pathways and offers an extensive overview of downstream endocrinological and endocrinological-related disorders. In addition, several chapters focus on transgenerational actions, which are a topic of particular interest. Lastly, evidence from preclinical and clinical studies provides the basis for an in-depth, critical discussion of each topic. The book is part of the SpringerReference program, which provides access to ‘living editions’ that are constantly updated using a dynamic peer-review publishing process.




Environmental Endocrinology


Book Description

From 11 to 15 July 1977 about 60 physiologists, endo crinologists, ecologists and other biologists from 14 countries convened at the University Montpellier for a symposium on Environmental Endocrinology. This meet ing was organized as a Satellite Symposium of the 27th International Congress of Physiological Sciences, Paris, 18-23 July 1977. This volume is a record of the com munications presented at the symposium. The objectives of the program were to examine the role of the endocrine system in a wide spectrum of adjustments and adaptations to changes in environmental conditions by various spe cies of animals, including man, and to promote an ex change of ideas among investigators who have approached these functions from diverse aspects. The diversity of the information and ideas communicated is great. Of necessity, they represent only an extremely modest se lection of the many facets of endocrine function in the interaction of animals with their environments. Be yond the usefulness of the communications individually, we hope that they collectively demonstrate the substan tial heuristic value of the concept of environmental endocrinology as it was perceived by the participants. We acknowledge gratefully the kindness and sympathy of Professor Jaques ROUZAUD, President of the University of Montpellier II, for his generous extension of the hospitality of the University to the Symposium. We are most grateful to Mrs. Monique VIEU who effected so well the secretarial organization of the Sympos.




Hormonally Active Agents in the Environment


Book Description

Some investigators have hypothesized that estrogens and other hormonally active agents found in the environment might be involved in breast cancer increases and sperm count declines in humans as well as deformities and reproductive problems seen in wildlife. This book looks in detail at the science behind the ominous prospect of "estrogen mimics" threatening health and well-being, from the level of ecosystems and populations to individual people and animals. The committee identifies research needs and offers specific recommendations to decision-makers. This authoritative volume: Critically evaluates the literature on hormonally active agents in the environment and identifies known and suspected toxicologic mechanisms and effects of fish, wildlife, and humans. Examines whether and how exposure to hormonally active agents occursâ€"in diet, in pharmaceuticals, from industrial releases into the environmentâ€"and why the debate centers on estrogens. Identifies significant uncertainties, limitations of knowledge, and weaknesses in the scientific literature. The book presents a wealth of information and investigates a wide range of examples across the spectrum of life that might be related to these agents.




Environmental Health Risk


Book Description

This book, Environmental Health Risk - Hazardous Factors to Living Species, is intended to provide a set of practical discussions and relevant tools for making risky decisions that require actions to reduce environmental health risk against environmental factors that may adversely impact human health or ecological balances. We aimed to compile information from diverse sources into a single volume to give some real examples extending concepts of those hazardous factors to living species that may stimulate new research ideas and trends in the relevant fields.




Environmental Impacts on Reproductive Health and Fertility


Book Description

Many reproductive and developmental health problems are caused by exposure to chemicals that are widely dispersed in our environment. These problems include infertility, miscarriage, poor pregnancy outcomes, abnormal fetal development, early puberty, endometriosis, and diseases and cancers of reproductive organs. The compelling nature of the collective science has resulted in recognition of a new field of environmental reproductive health. Focusing on exposures to environmental contaminants, particularly during critical periods in development and their potential effects on all aspects of future reproductive life-course, this book provides the first comprehensive source of information bringing together the arguments that are spread out among various scientific disciplines in environmental health, clinical and public health fields. It provides a review of the science in key areas of the relationship between environmental contaminants and reproductive health outcomes, and recommendations on efforts toward prevention in clinical care and public policy.




Dioxins and Health


Book Description

This book originated in a series of cross-disciplinary conversations in the years 1984-1990 between the editor, who is a physician-researcher involved in clinical and laboratory research, and a dioxin toxicologist. During the years in which the conversations took place, an extraordinary amount of new scientific literature was published related to dioxins, defined for purposes of this text as the chlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins, dibenzofurans, polychlorinated biphe nyls (PCB's) and other compounds that are structurally and toxicologically similar to 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (2,3,7 ,8-TCDD), the most extensively studied and most toxic of this group of chemicals. Dioxins also began to interest not only chemists and toxicologists, but also specialists from diverse disciplines such as wildlife and environmental science, immunology, neuroscience,public health, epidemiology, med icine, government, law, sociology, and journalism. Specialists from such varied disciplines, while familiar with their own literature, frequently did not have time to follow the dioxin literature outside their specialty area. In addition, each specialty had unique knowledge, methods, and perspectives. Cross disciplinary conversation was necessary, but all too frequently, specialists from the various disciplines did not speak the same language, resulting in misunderstanding.




Sicker, Fatter, Poorer


Book Description

A leading voice in public health policy and top environmental medicine scientist reveals the alarming truth about how hormone-disrupting chemicals are affecting our daily lives--and what we can do to protect ourselves and fight back. Lurking in our homes, hiding in our offices, and polluting the air we breathe is something sinister. Something we've turned a blind eye to for far too long. Dr. Leonardo Trasande, a pediatrician, professor, and world-renowned researcher, tells the story of how our everyday surroundings are making us sicker, fatter, and poorer. Dr. Trasande exposes the chemicals that disrupt our hormonal systems and damage our health in irreparable ways. He shows us where these chemicals hide--in our homes, our schools, at work, in our food, and countless other places we can't control--as well as the workings of policy that protects the continued use of these chemicals in our lives. Drawing on extensive research and expertise, he outlines dramatic studies and emerging evidence about the rapid increases in neurodevelopmental, metabolic, reproductive, and immunological diseases directly related to the hundreds of thousands of chemicals that we are exposed to every day. Unfortunately, nowhere is safe. But, thanks to Dr. Trasande's work on the topic, and his commitment to effecting change, this book can help. Through a blend of narrative, scientific detective work, and concrete information about the connections between chemicals and disease, he shows us what we can do to protect ourselves and our families in the short-term, and how we can help bring the change we deserve.




Toxic Bodies


Book Description

In 1941 the Food and Drug Administration approved the use of diethylstilbestrol (DES), the first synthetic chemical to be marketed as an estrogen and one of the first to be identified as a hormone disruptor—a chemical that mimics hormones. Although researchers knew that DES caused cancer and disrupted sexual development, doctors prescribed it for millions of women, initially for menopause and then for miscarriage, while farmers gave cattle the hormone to promote rapid weight gain. Its residues, and those of other chemicals, in the American food supply are changing the internal ecosystems of human, livestock, and wildlife bodies in increasingly troubling ways. In this gripping exploration, Nancy Langston shows how these chemicals have penetrated into every aspect of our bodies and ecosystems, yet the U.S. government has largely failed to regulate them and has skillfully manipulated scientific uncertainty to delay regulation. Personally affected by endocrine disruptors, Langston argues that the FDA needs to institute proper regulation of these commonly produced synthetic chemicals.




Challenges in Endocrine Disruptor Toxicology and Risk Assessment


Book Description

Insight into the role of hormones, particularly estrogen and testosterone, in health and disease etiology – including interactions with other hormone pathways – has dramatically changed. Estrogen and androgen receptors, with their polymorphisms, are key molecules in all tissues and are involved in a number of homeostatic mechanisms but also pathological processes including carcinogenesis and the development of metabolic and neurological disorders such as diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease. Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) can interfere with the endocrine (hormone) systems at certain dosages and play a key role in the pathology of disease. Most known EDCs are manmade and are therefore an increasing concern given the number commonly found in household products and the environment. This book will cover the mechanisms of EDC pathology across the spectrum of disease, as well as risk assessment and government and legal regulation to provide a holistic view of the current issues and cutting-edge research in the topic. With contributions from global leaders in the field, this book will be an ideal reference for toxicologists, endocrinologists and researchers interested in developmental biology, regulatory toxicology and the interface between environment and human health.




Count Down


Book Description

In the tradition of Silent Spring and The Sixth Extinction, an urgent, meticulously researched, and groundbreaking book about the ways in which chemicals in the modern environment are changing—and endangering—human sexuality and fertility on the grandest scale, from renowned epidemiologist Shanna Swan. In 2017, author Shanna Swan and her team of researchers completed a major study. They found that over the past four decades, sperm levels among men in Western countries have dropped by more than 50 percent. They came to this conclusion after examining 185 studies involving close to 45,000 healthy men. The result sent shockwaves around the globe—but the story didn’t end there. It turns out our sexual development is changing in broader ways, for both men and women and even other species, and that the modern world is on pace to become an infertile one. How and why could this happen? What is hijacking our fertility and our health? Count Down unpacks these questions, revealing what Swan and other researchers have learned about how both lifestyle and chemical exposures are affecting our fertility, sexual development—potentially including the increase in gender fluidity—and general health as a species. Engagingly explaining the science and repercussions of these worldwide threats and providing simple and practical guidelines for effectively avoiding chemical goods (from water bottles to shaving cream) both as individuals and societies, Count Down is at once an urgent wake-up call, an illuminating read, and a vital tool for the protection of our future.