Methoxychlor, a currently used pesticide, is a proestrogen exhibiting estrogenic activity in mammals in vivo. Methoxychlor undergoes oxidative metabolism by cytochromes P450, yielding 1,1,1-trichloro-2-(4-hydroxyphenyl)-2-(4-methoxyphenyl)ethane (mono-OH-M) and 1,1,1-trichloro-2,2-bis(4-hydroxyphenyl)ethane (bis-OH-M) as main metabolites. Since humans may be exposed to these estrogenic metaboli...

Considerable amounts of organochlorine pesticides (DDT, lindane, heptachlor and methoxychlor) were detected in drinking water samples during a two-year study in Warka-Grojec rural region of Poland. The average incidence of drinking water sources with detectable levels of pesticides ranged from 20 to 30%. According to Polish regulations concerning water quality, individual concentrations did not...

Considerable attention has recently been focused on environmental chemicals that disrupt the reproductive system by altering steroid receptor function. Although numerous in vitro and in vivo methods have been shown to be useful approaches for identifying chemicals that can disrupt reproduction through a direct interaction with the estrogen receptor, it is imperative that the protocols selected ...

Despite more than 20 years of intensive use there are major uncertainties about the environmental distribution and degradative fate of the various organochlorine pesticides in food web organisms. The problem is both controversial and momentous, as 88,641,000 pounds of cyclodienes and toxaphene and 59,316,000 pounds of DDT were produced in the United States in 1970 (1). The laboratory model ecos...

Aquatic birds are often used as a health indicator of the marine ecosystem. African penguins living in the zoo make good research material as they form a link between the marine and the terrestrial ecosystem in terms of xenobiotic circulation. Tests were performed on whole herring-the food of the penguins-as well as on bird muscle, liver, brain, eggs, feathers and guano in order to determine to...