Abstract
The human endocrine system plays an important role in the human body by secreting hormones that regulate the cellular and organ system homeostasis. Many environmental chemical agents have been known to disrupt the endocrine system. Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals (EDCs) are constantly released to the environment via domestic and industrial wastes. EDCs are used in the manufacture of most everyday consumer products such as plastics bottles, food additives, metal food cans, pesticides and cosmetics.Bisphenol A is a well-known example of EDCs and has been demonstrated by many in vitro studies to exhibit estrogenic activities thereby altering the body´s normal hormonal response. It therefore modulates the body´s endocrine system leading to adverse health and developmental effects in humans and other animals. Due to legislation, BPA was removed from the market and replaced by BPS which is more heat resistant. However, it has been suggested that Bisphenol S used as a plasticizing substitute compound for BPA exhibits similar estrogenic activities. The aim of this study is to investigate the possible endocrine disrupting effects of BPA and BPS alone and BPA or BPS in combination with estradiol (E2) on human ovarian cancer (BG-1) cell lines. These effects were monitored using the WST-1 and the xCELLigence system. It was observed that BPA, at low doses stimulated cell growth and at higher concentrations (1.96E-04M and 5.89E-04M) induced cell death. BPS, a potential substitute for BPA showed the same profile as that of BPA but the toxicity was less when compared to BPA. Mixtures of BPA/E2 and BPS/E2 induced more cell toxicity compared to the compounds alone, indicating the ability of BPA and BPS to disrupt the action of physiologic estrogen.
| Date of Award | 2014 |
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| Original language | English |
| Awarding Institution |
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| Supervisor | Ann Pauwels (Advisor) & Kersten Van Langenhove (Advisor) |