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Contaminated Pittsburgh Fish Studied

Posted on: Wednesday, 18 April 2007, 12:00 CDT

Scientists at the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute suggest fish caught in Pittsburgh rivers contain substances that mimic the actions of estrogen.

The scientists said since fish can concentrate chemicals from their habitat within their bodies, the findings suggest feminizing chemicals might be making their way into the region's waterways.

The study also demonstrated the chemicals extracted from the fish can cause growth of estrogen-sensitive breast cancer cells cultured in the laboratory.

We decided to look at pisciverous fish -- those that eat other fish -- for this project because we know that they bioaccumulate contaminants from water and their prey, which may include toxic metals, farm and industrial runoff and wastes from aging municipal sewer systems, said Conrad Volz, the study's principal investigator. The goals of this project are to use fish as environmental sensors of chemicals in the water and the aquatic food chain, and to determine the origins of these chemical contaminants.

The research, which focused on white bass and channel catfish caught in the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio Rivers, was presented in Los Angeles this week during the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research.

Source: United Press International

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