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Endocrine disruption in crustaceans - a “new” environmental challenge?
Citation:
Tollefsen, K., M. Cronin, L. Evenseth, C. Mellor, J. Firman, T. Iguchi, I. Sylte, K. Toyota, Y. Song, C. Lalone, AND D. Villeneuve. Endocrine disruption in crustaceans - a “new” environmental challenge? International Symposium on Pollutant Responses In Marine Organisms, Charleston, SC, May 19 - 22, 2019.
Impact/Purpose:
Our understanding of the impact of chemicals on invertebrate endocrine systems is limited, although they may have significant impact on growth, development, and reproduction. This project explored how chemicals adversely impact or disrupt the biology of invertebrate molting (shedding of the exoskeleton), which is a critical endocrine relevant process, using both experimental and computational approaches. The results of this work more clearly defined the events in the biological pathway that leads to the inhibition of molting which can be used for cumulative risk assessment for the protection of invertebrate species.
Description:
A number of exogenous compounds have the potential to interfere with the endocrine system of animals. This may perturb vital endocrine processes to a degree causing an adverse effect (outcome) on ecologically relevant endpoints such as growth, development, and reproduction. These endocrine disrupting (ED) effects have been well characterized in aquatic vertebrates and mammals due to their well-defined endocrine systems and substantial recent research effort. However, knowledge of ED effects in a larger range of species is still poorly characterized. Lack of knowledge and availability of suitable bioassays are currently major limiting factors for high-throughput screening, chemical prioritization and risk assessment of endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) in aquatic non-vertebrates such as crustaceans. The present project has focused on developing Adverse Outcome Pathways (AOPs) for EDs in aquatic arthropods such as crustaceans, and applying these to assess the hazard and risk of single chemicals and ecologically relevant complex mixtures of pollutants. Although several ED mechanisms have been proposed to be relevant, perturbations of ecdysone receptor (EcR) signaling and disruption of molting events have been proposed to be of particular concern. The present study focused on the application of computational and experimental efforts to 1) develop conceptual AOPs for EcR-mediated effects, 2) provide linkage between the most relevant MoA and adverse outcomes using a suite of in silico, in vitro and in vivo tests, 3) screen and identify priority EDCs from large chemical inventories for prioritization purposes, and 34) perform cumulative risk assessment of ecologically relevant exposure scenarios to identify whether these EDCs represent an environmental challenge. A detailed description of approaches, deliverables and data generated from the project are provided at www.niva.no/edrisk.