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BookmarkScienceDaily (May 27, 2008) — Since the 1962 publication of Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, awareness of how environmental toxicants can impact fertility has increased.
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In a new article, Steinberg and colleagues provide evidence that adverse reproductive effects of toxicants may extend not only to the children of exposed individuals, but also to the next generation.
They treated pregnant rats with a mixture of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and found that reproductive markers were disrupted not only in the female offspring of these rats, but also in the "grand offspring," which are derived from oocytes present in fetuses of the treated females.
Changes in the second generation included blunting of preovulatory LH release, reduced progesterone concentrations and reduced uterine weights.
The use of low doses of PCBs in this study increases the potential relevance of these findings to reproductive health.
Journal reference:
- Rebecca M. Steinberg, Deena M. Walker, Thomas E. Juenger, Michael J. Woller, and Andrea C. Gore. Effects of Perinatal Polychlorinated Biphenyls on Adult Female Rat Reproduction: Development, Reproductive Physiology, and Second Generational Effects. Biology of Reproduction. 2008; 78:1091-1101. Published online in BOR-Papers In Press 27 February 2008; DOI 10.1095/biolreprod.107.067249
