Elevated exposures to polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) flame retardants have been linked to developmental neurotoxicity in children and endocrine disruption in adults. A growing body of evidence shows that children’s bodies have higher levels of PBDEs than adults’, possibly because of greater hand-to-mouth activity. One of the largest studies to date of PBDE uptake in children provides impo...

OBJECTIVES Bacopa monnieri (BM), a traditional ayurvedic medicine, is a well-known memory enhancer. We have explored the role of BM against decabrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE-209)-induced alterations in neonate and young female mice. MATERIALS AND METHODS Mice were orally administered with B. monnieri at the doses of 40, 80 or 120 mg/kg body weight along with PBDE-209 (20 mg/kg body weight) ...

Organohalogen compounds are some of the most notorious persistent pollutants disturbing the Earth biosphere. Although human-made, these chemicals are not completely alien to living systems. A large number of natural organohalogens, part of the secondary metabolism, are involved in chemical trophic interactions. Surprisingly, the relationship between organisms' trophic position and synthetic org...

Polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) body burdens in the general U.S. population have been linked to the consumption of red meat and poultry. Exposure estimates have also indicated that meat products are a major contributor to PBDE dietary intake. To establish solid estimates of PBDE concentrations in domestic meat and poultry, samples from two statistically designed surveys of U.S. meat and po...

Little to no information exists for polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) in marine mammals frequenting the highly urbanized southern California (USA) coast. Fourteen PBDE congeners were determined by GC-ECNI-MS in blubber of pinnipeds stranded locally between 1994 and 2006. Total PBDE concentrations (SigmaPBDE) in California sea lion (n = 63) ranged from 0.04 to 33.7 microg/g wet weight (mean...

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are abundant in aquatic environment. However, only few studies have investigated their impacts on freshwater invertebrates. This work aimed to study the effects of BDE-47 and BDE-99 congeners on the chitobiase and chitinolytic enzymes activities of the freshwater amphipod Gammarus pulex, according to gender, PBDE concentration and time of exposure. In addi...

Total PBDE concentrations determined in archived blubber samples from franciscana dolphins (Pontoporia blainvillei) unintentionally captured in the Brazilian coastal region off Rio Grande do Sul State (FMA III) between 1994 and 2004 (n = 73) ranged from 7.9 to 65 ng g(-1) lipid weight in mature males, with an increase over the ten-year period. Total PBDE concentrations in blubber samples collec...

The helicase portion of the hepatitis C virus nonstructural protein 3 (NS3) is considered one of the most validated targets for developing direct acting antiviral agents. We isolated polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) 1 from a marine sponge as an NS3 helicase inhibitor. In this study, we evaluated the inhibitory effects of PBDE (1) on the essential activities of NS3 protein such as RNA helica...

To reveal what degree bioaccumulation of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) depends on exposure time and other factors, we conducted a semi-field experiment for a year (June 2008-June 2009) in a village in an e-waste recycling site in Taizhou, China. Approximately one hundred of juvenile ducks (Anas domestica Linnaeus) were entrusted to a villager. The ducks lived and forged in a PBDE-pollu...

This manuscript critically considers several areas of study of the polybrominated diphenyl ether compounds. Specifically, a brief review of PBDE toxicity is followed by an in depth discussion of PBDE occurrence in abiotic and biotic environmental matrices. Temporal and geographic trends are examined in conjunction with risk assessment factors. Rather than summarize or tabulate the growing body ...