Assessing the Effects of Endocrine Disrupters (EDCs) from a St. Paul Sewage Treatment Plant on Sperm Viability and Testicular Development in Fish: Adding a New Dimension to an Existing Project (original) (raw)
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Environmental …, 2000
Sewage treatment works (STW) effluents throughout the U.K. have been shown to be estrogenic, inducing vitellogenin (VTG) synthesis in caged and wild fish for considerable distances (up to several kilometers) downstream of the effluent discharge. Thresholds for vitellogenin induction in caged fish in those studies have been derived from shortterm exposures, and may not necessarily be representative of thresholds for estrogenic responses in wild fish living in rivers that contain STW effluent. In addition, very little is known about the long-term fluctuations in the concentrations of the estrogenic components of STW effluents. In this paper, it was established that the concentrations of natural steroid estrogens and xenoestrogens (alkylphenolic chemicals) in a treated sewage effluent fluctuated temporally (over 8 months), from between 36 and 308 ng/L and between <0.2 (detection limit) and 10.7 µg/L, respectively. Long-term exposure of maturing adult roach to a graded concentration of this effluent (0, 9.4, 17.5, 37.9, and 100% v/v) demonstrated that the vitellogenic response was both dose and time dependent. After 1 month exposure, the response threshold was 37.9 ( 2.3% treated sewage effluent, whereas after 4 months exposure, a significant induction of VTG occurred at an effluent concentration of 9.4 ( 0.9%. The data presented suggests that estrogenic responses in wild fish living in U.K. rivers cannot necessarily be predicted from short-term exposures using caged fish. The functional significance and/or ecological consequences of induction of vitellogenin resulting from exposure to STW effluent has yet to be determined in wild fish.
Critical Reviews in Toxicology, 2012
Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) enter aquatic ecosystems through discharged effluents, mainly from wastewater treatment works and diffuse run off from land, and affect a wide range of aquatic biota, including fish. Evidence for altered physiology in fish as a consequence of endocrine disruption is global, with some of the most widely reported effects on sexual development and function. In recent years research has shown that fish behaviors can also be affected by EDCs which potentially has wide implications for individual fitness and population level outcomes. This review presents a critical assessment on reported effects of EDCs on behavior in fish, focusing on behaviors associated with reproduction. We investigate commonalities and differences in sexual behaviors between fish species most commonly applied in ecotoxicology, drawing out common principles for impacts of EDCs and then reviewing the evidence for, and implications of, disruptions of these behaviors after exposures to EDCs. In an analysis of the reported effects of exposure to the estrogen, ethinylestradiol, we show that life-stage at exposure is a key factor determining behavioral responses of affected populations. EDC-induced changes in behavior occur at similar concentrations as for established biomarker responses (e.g. vitellogenin induction for estrogens), indicating behavior is equally sensitive (and non-invasive) as an indicator of EDC exposure. Adopting behaviors in fish as indicators of chemical exposure and effects, however, still has many technical and interpretation challenges and there is very little information available on how behaviors under laboratory conditions equate with those occurring in wild populations.
Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, 2001
Several recent in situ studies have reported that domestic and mixed domestic/industrial sewage effluents contain one or more natural or anthropogenic estrogenic substances. Those studies examined caged or feral fish for the presence of the egg yolk precursor protein, vitellogenin (VTG), in the blood of male fish. We have previously reported that male, feral carp (Cyprinus carpio) obtained from the effluent channel of a major sewage treatment plant (STP) exhibited depressed serum testosterone (T) concentrations, as well as detectable levels of VTG. The present study examines male and female walleye (Stizostedion vitreum), a native species with a different life history and feeding habits, collected from the same Mississippi River locations below the St. Paul metropolitan STP. All male and female walleye collected from the effluent channel contained measurable levels of VTG in their blood. Males from that location also exhibited depressed serum T concentrations and elevated serum estradiol-17 (E2) concentrations compared with males from the Snake River reference site. Males obtained from Mississippi River Navigational Pool #2 (MRP-2), 3-20 miles downstream of the STP also exhibited reduced serum T concentrations, but showed no alterations in E2 concentrations or the presence of VTG in the serum. Females collected at the STP site had greatly elevated serum E2 concentrations, but serum T concentrations were not different from females collected in the Snake River. Our results demonstrate that the St. Paul metropolitan STP continues to release an estrogenic effluent, capable of inducing VTG production and altering normal serum sex steroid concentrations in a commercially valuable, native fish, the walleye. Additional studies will be required to determine whether these observations portend long-term population level effects.
Endocrine Toxicants and Reproductive Success in Fish
Human and Ecological Risk Assessment: An International Journal, 2001
There is compelling evidence on a global scale for compromised growth and reproduction, altered development, and abnormal behaviour in feral fish that can be correlated or in some cases causally linked with exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs). Attributing cause and effect relationships for EDCs is a specific challenge for studies with feral fish as many factors including food availability, disease, competition and loss of habitat also affect reproduction and development. Even in cases where there are physiological responses of fish exposed to EDCs (e.g., changes in reproductive hormone titres, vitellogenin levels), the utility of these measures in extrapolating to whole animal reproductive or developmental outcomes is often limited. Although fish differ from other vertebrates in certain aspects of their endocrinology, there is little evidence that fish are more sensitive to the effects of EDCs. Therefore, to address why endocrine disruption seems so widespread in fish, it is necessary to consider aspects of fish physiology and their environment that may increase their exposure to EDCs. Dependence on aquatic respiration, strategies for iono-osmotic regulation, and maternal transfer of contaminants to eggs creates additional avenues by which fish are exposed to EDCs. This paper provides an overview of responses observed in feral fish populations that have been attributed to EDCs and illustrates many of the factors that need consideration in evaluating the risks posed by these chemicals.
Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 2014
Fishes were collected at 16 sites within the three major river drainages (Delaware, Susquehanna, and Ohio) of Pennsylvania. Three species were evaluated for biomarkers of estrogenic/antiandrogenic exposure, including plasma vitellogenin and testicular oocytes in male fishes. Smallmouth bass Micropterus dolomieu, white sucker Catostomus commersonii, and redhorse sucker Moxostoma species were collected in the summer, a period of low flow and low reproductive activity. Smallmouth bass were the only species in which testicular oocytes were observed; however, measurable concentrations of plasma vitellogenin were found in male bass and white sucker. The percentage of male bass with testicular oocytes ranged from 10 to 100%, with the highest prevalence and severity in bass collected in the Susquehanna drainage. The percentage of males with plasma vitellogenin ranged from 0 to 100% in both bass and sucker. Biological findings were compared with chemical analyses of discrete water samples collected at the time of fish collections. Estrone concentrations correlated with testicular oocytes prevalence and severity and with the percentage of male bass with vitellogenin. No correlations were noted with the percentage of male sucker with vitellogenin and water chemical concentrations. The prevalence and severity of testicular oocytes in bass also correlated with the percent of agricultural land use in the watershed above a site. Two sites within the Susquehanna drainage and one in the Delaware were immediately downstream of wastewater treatment plants to compare results with upstream fish. The percentage of male bass with testicular oocytes was not consistently higher downstream; however, severity did tend to increase downstream.
Aquatic Toxicology, 2010
Biomarkers are commonly used as signposts to evaluate the potential of contaminants to disrupt the endocrine system. However, the relationship between responses in these biomarkers and whole organism endpoints that directly affect population status is not clearly understood. In this study, the relationship between egg production (a whole-organism endpoint which has been directly linked to population-level responses) and biomarkers (sex steroids, vitellogenin (VTG) and gonad size) is examined. Data were collected from short-term reproductive tests in which a wide variety of fish species were exposed to a suite of contaminants with known or unknown modes/mechanisms of action (MOA). The potential to use biomarkers as signposts was evaluated by determining the occurrence of false negatives (i.e., an effect in egg production was not accompanied by a biomarker response) and false positives (i.e., an effect in biomarkers was not followed by an effect in egg production). The quantitative relationships between biomarkers and egg production, and the ability to use these quantitative relationships to predict population-level responses based on modeling was also assessed. A suite of female biomarkers resulted in a relatively low occurrence of both false positives and negatives, indicating the potential for their use as signposts for reproductive effects via endocrine disruption. Egg production in short-term adult fish reproductive tests showed significant relationships to 17-estradiol (E 2 ), changes in female VTG levels, and relative female gonad size (gonadosomatic index; GSI). Weaker significant relationships were found between egg production and both VTG levels and GSI in males. However, use of these quantitative relationships to predict population-level effects are cautioned because of high levels of uncertainty. This study demonstrates that there are qualitative and quantitative relationships among biomarkers, regardless of fish species used or the MOA of contaminants and concludes that a suite of female reproductive biomarkers can be used as effective signposts to screen chemicals and assess waste streams for endocrine disrupting substances with different MOA.
Gender Transformed: Endocrine Disruptors in the Environment.
In the late 1970s, anglers in England began reporting that they were catching bizarre fish-rainbow trout that seemed to be partly male and partly female. Perplexed, a biologist from Brunei University named John Sumpter went out to investigate these reports of what the media called "sexually confused fish."l He discovered that the trout were males that had indeed developed female characters, and he found that the best places to find these gender-bending fish were near sewage plants, in the lagoons and pools just below the discharge outlets for treated waste. The obvious question occurred to him: could anything in the sewage effluent be affecting the masculinity of the fish? Sumpter, with the help of fellow Brunei University biologist Charles R. Tyler and researchers from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Food, found male fish that were producing elevated levels of vitellogenin, a protein responsible for making egg yolks in female fish. Male fish possess a gene that can produce vitellogenin when triggered by estrogen, but ordinarily males lack enough estrogen-a female sex hormone--to trigger this gene. To test whether sewage treatment plants had anything to do with the elevated levels of vitellogenin in the male fish blood, the scientists took healthy male trout raised in captivity, put them in cages, and placed them for three weeks near the discharge points of thirty different sewage treatment plants. Soon those males began producing vitellogenin, just like females. 2