Department of Environmental Technology, Technical University Berlin, 10623 Berlin, Germany.
Quantitative Sustainability Assessment, Department of Technology, Management and Economics, Technical University of Denmark, 2800 Kgs. Lyngby, Denmark.
Sci Total Environ. 2021 Mar 25;762:143874. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.143874. Epub 2020 Dec 3.
Endocrine-disrupting chemicals have the ability to interfere with and alter functions of the hormone system, leading to adverse effects on reproduction, growth and development. Despite growing concerns over their now ubiquitous presence in the environment, endocrine-related human health effects remain largely outside of comparative human toxicity characterization frameworks as applied for example in life cycle impact assessments. In this paper, we propose a new methodological framework to consistently integrate endocrine-related health effects into comparative human toxicity characterization. We present two quantitative and operational approaches for extrapolating towards a common point of departure from both in vivo and dosimetry-adjusted in vitro endocrine-related effect data and deriving effect factors as well as corresponding characterization factors for endocrine-active/endocrine-disrupting chemicals. Following the proposed approaches, we calculated effect factors for 323 chemicals, reflecting their endocrine potency, and related characterization factors for 157 chemicals, expressing their relative endocrine-related human toxicity potential. Developed effect and characterization factors are ready for use in the context of chemical prioritization and substitution as well as life cycle impact assessment and other comparative assessment frameworks. Endocrine-related effect factors were found comparable to existing effect factors for cancer and non-cancer effects, indicating that (1) the chemicals' endocrine potency is not necessarily higher or lower than other effect potencies and (2) using dosimetry-adjusted effect data to derive effect factors does not consistently overestimate the effect of potential endocrine disruptors. Calculated characterization factors span over 8-11 orders of magnitude for different substances and emission compartments and are dominated by the range in endocrine potencies.
内分泌干扰化学物质能够干扰和改变激素系统的功能，对生殖、生长和发育产生不利影响。尽管人们越来越关注这些化学物质在环境中无处不在，但内分泌相关的人类健康影响在很大程度上仍然超出了比较人类毒性特征框架的范围，例如在生命周期影响评估中。在本文中，我们提出了一种新的方法框架，以将内分泌相关的健康影响一致地纳入比较人类毒性特征框架中。我们提出了两种定量和可操作的方法，用于从体内和剂量调整的体外内分泌相关效应数据中推断出共同的起始点，并推导出效应因子以及内分泌活性/内分泌干扰化学物质的相应特征化因子。根据提出的方法，我们计算了 323 种化学物质的效应因子，反映了它们的内分泌效力，以及 157 种化学物质的相关特征化因子，表达了它们相对的内分泌相关人类毒性潜力。开发的效应和特征化因子可用于化学物质优先排序和替代、生命周期影响评估和其他比较评估框架。发现内分泌相关的效应因子与癌症和非癌症效应的现有效应因子相当，这表明：（1）化学物质的内分泌效力不一定高于或低于其他效应效力；（2）使用剂量调整的效应数据来推导出效应因子不会一致地高估潜在内分泌干扰物的效应。计算出的特征化因子跨越了不同物质和排放区的 8-11 个数量级，主要由内分泌效力的范围决定。
