EDC Science Weekly, Sept. 4-10, 2026

A summary of articles on endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) added to PubMed this week.

Contents: Events, Regulations/Policy, Methods/Tools/Screening, Commentaries, Reviews/Meta-Analyses, Human Health Studies, Laboratory Studies, Exposure/Environment Studies

Highlights:

Hidden Hazards: Nontargeted Chemical Analysis Reveals Widespread Contaminants and Mislabeling in Personal Care and Cleaning Products
Household food security and urinary phthalate metabolite concentrations among US adults: Evidence from NHANES 2003-2018.
Residential Lead Service Lines and Child Blood Lead Levels in Flint, Michigan, 2010-2019

Science summaries and highlights

Events

Sept. 15 webinar: The Social Cost of Plastic [Beyond Plastics, Duke, NRDC]

Sept. 22-23: 2026 Plastics and Human Health Symposium (in NYC with streaming) [NYU Langone Health’s Center for the Investigation of Environmental Hazards (CIEH) and the Food Packaging Forum]

Sept. 30: Application due date for the HEEDS Lou Guillette Jr. Outstanding Young Investigator Award.

Oct. 1: Application due date for the Seeding Change/Agents of Change cohort.

Oct. 6 webinar: Glyphosate Science: Cancer, neurotoxicity & endocrine disruption [CHE]

Oct. 6 – Nov. 24 course: Plastics, Microplastics, and Human Health [Physician and Scientist Network Addressing Plastics and Health (P-SNAP)]

Oct. 8: Children’s Environmental Health Day [Children’s Environmental Health Network]

Oct. 13 workshop: What can nurses do about toxic chemicals? Toxics 101, Communicating Effectively About the Science and Health Effects & Opportunities for Action [Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments (ANHE)]

Oct. 13 Grand Rounds: Growing Up in a Chemical World: Emerging Contaminants and Children’s Health [New England PEHSU and Boston Children’s Hospital]

Dec. 15 due date for Call for Papers: Microplastics, Community Health, and Public Health Actions [American Journal of Public Health]

Mar. 31 due date for Call For Papers: The Chemical Safety Knowledge Landscape: Mapping What We Know and What We Need to Know [ACS Publications]

Regulations/Policy

Next Generation Risk Assessment for Cosmetic Ingredients in Europe: Current Status and Future Outlook

Japanese perspective on NAMs for regulatory use

The influence and impact of human relevance in (CLP) classification for human health hazard endpoints

A critical evaluation and optimization of combustion ion chromatography (CIC) for total fluorine quantification in plastic matrices relevant to PFAS regulation.

More EDC policy, FPF’s regulations open for comment, and Science’s Trump-Tracker.

Methods/Tools/Screening

Protocol for measuring endocrine-disruptive effects on transcriptional bursting using single-molecule imaging in human breast cancer cells.

The zebrafish embryo as a potential 3R-compliant model to identify endocrine activity across estrogenic, androgenic and steroidogenic (EAS) modalities.

Commentaries

The hidden impacts of endocrine-disrupting chemicals on endometrial and pregnancy health.

Can we do more to address long-term harms of medicine use? Learning from the DES (diethylstilboestrol) disaster.

Respiratory toxicity of perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) via Inflammasome involvement.

What Biology Receives: PFAS, Microplastics, and Contact Dose at Living Interfaces.

PFAS-defined liquid crystal monomers: An overlooked class of organofluorine contaminants. [letter]

The missing microbial link in triclosan toxicity: comment on mechanism of liver fibrosis induced by life-long triclosan exposure in offspring rats. [letter]

Drinking Water Contaminants Associated With Uterine Cancer Risk [News item in JAMA Network]

Reviews/Meta-Analyses

Numerous Chemicals/Mixtures

Human health impact of endocrine disruptors: time to regain our stolen future!

Hidden Crisis: The Threat of Environment to Reproductive Health.

Environmental factors related to pathogenesis of hepatocellular carcinoma.

Disruption of hormonal balance and the potential development of cancer – the impact of endocrine disruptors.

Review on emerging marine pollutants: sources, risks, and governance of EDCs, PFAS, microplastics, and antibiotics.

Persistent Organic Pollutants: PCBs, Dioxin, OCPs

Polychlorinated Diphenyl Ethers and One Health: An Integrated Perspective on an Underestimated Class of Persistent Organic Pollutants.

PFAS

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in food contact materials: A critical review of analytical strategies, migration behavior, and regulatory frameworks (2005 – 2025).

Microplastics/Nanomaterials

Effects of microplastics and nanoplastics on the brain and behavior: Evidence from rodent and human studies.

Microplastic in human body – a critical insight into current microplastic research.

Pharmaceuticals/Personal Care Products

Pharmaceuticals and personal care products in freshwater environments: Environmental fate, ecotoxicity, and remediation strategies.

Miscellaneous

Antimicrobial Surfaces for Reusable Food Packaging: A Comprehensive Review of Functionality and Suitability.

Human Health Studies

Numerous Chemicals/Mixtures

Prenatal and childhood exposure to mixtures of endocrine-disrupting chemicals in association with measures of adiposity in childhood and adolescence.

Long-Term Industrial Emissions Exposure and Cognitive Impairment in Older U.S. Adults: A Longitudinal Cohort Study.

Maternal-fetal distribution of synthetic phenolic antioxidants and their associations with gestational diabetes mellitus: A cross-sectional analysis nested within the Chongqing PREBIC cohort.

Phthalates

Prenatal and early life phthalate exposure and early life stress: no interactions with adolescent internalizing symptoms.

Associations between urinary phthalate and benzophenone metabolites and early puberty timing in girls.

Phthalate exposure and osteoporosis: NHANES associations and integrative in silico prioritization of candidate molecular targets.

Parabens/Triclosan/Antimicrobials

Environmental Exposure to Triclosan Promotes Rheumatoid Arthritis via KEAP1/NRF2 Inhibition and Subsequent IL-17 Signaling Activation.

Persistent Organic Pollutants: PCBs, Dioxin, OCPs

Mediating role of telomere shortening in dioxin-like polychlorinated biphenyls associated cognitive decline in children.

Cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships between exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls and predicted 10-year atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease risk: Integrated epidemiological and bioinformatics analysis.

PFAS

Association of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances with polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome and endocrine abnormalities: A case-control study.

Dietary folate, vitamin D, and inflammation modify associations between prenatal per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) exposures and fetal growth.

Association between plasma levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances and schizophrenia: A case-control study.

Mortality study of a PFOA-exposed cohort in the mid-Ohio Valley.

PFOS exposure is linked to immune-metabolic disruption in MASLD: integrated population, computational, and experimental evidence.

Flame Retardants

Menopause-specific associations of organophosphate esters with sex hormones among US women.

Association of organophosphate flame retardant exposure with female infertility: Cross-sectional and mechanistic evidence.

Pesticides

Associations between pyrethroid insecticide concentrations and dyslipidemia: Findings from the Dongfeng-Tongji cohort.

Metals/Metalloids

Prenatal Water Fluoride Exposure and Children’s Behavioral Problems and related Ecological Fluoride and Neurodevelopment Studies—An Important Starting Point.

Multi-level evidence for Pb-Cd co-exposure nephrotoxicity: An integrated analysis of NHANES, outcome-oriented network toxicology, and cell-based validation.

Analyses of neurotoxicity following multiple metal exposures among adults living along the Yangtze River in Anhui Province, China: In vitro experiments with mild cognitive impairment integrating community population cohort.

Air Pollution

Exposure Biomarkers of Airborne Organic Pollutants in Pregnant Women and Developmental Risks: Evidence from Epidemiology to In Vitro Assessment.

Pharmaceuticals/Personal Care Products

Prenatal Acetaminophen (Paracetamol) Use and the Risk of Autism and/or Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Among Sibling-Matched Cohorts and related Acetaminophen Use in Pregnancy and Neurodevelopmental Outcomes—Reassuring Evidence From a Matched-Sibling Study and Acetaminophen Use During Pregnancy Is Unlikely to Cause Autism or ADHD, New Study Reaffirms.

Fetal exposure to paracetamol is associated with altered markers of ovarian development and reduced uterine volume in girls: the COPANA study.

Laboratory Studies

Numerous Chemicals/Mixtures

Heavy metals or emerging organic contaminants: Which drive zebrafish embryo toxicity in printed circuit board manufacturing wastewater?

Phenotypic attenuation masks persistent molecular perturbations during PFOS-cadmium co-exposure in zebrafish larvae.

Bisphenols

Left BLP to dmPFC circuit dysfunction underlies autism-like behaviors induced by prenatal and lactational Bisphenol S exposure.

Bisphenol A promotes prostatic inflammatory susceptibility via PI3K/AKT-mediated mitochondrial stress and NLRP3 inflammasome sensitization.

Differential impact of bisphenol S on human arterial endothelial cells from healthy and type-2 diabetic donors: a high-content imaging study.

Phthalates

Network toxicology and single-cell analysis reveal molecular mechanisms of DEHP-induced colorectal cancer.

Diet-dependent effects of an environmentally relevant dose of polyethylene and polyethylene terephthalate on white adipose tissue and systemic insulin resistance in mice.

Subchronic diethyl phthalate exposure aggravates Alzheimer-like phenotypes in 5XFAD mice: partial attenuation by Akt activation.

Curcumin attenuates di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate-induced hepatic injury in chicks via oxidative stress, glycolysis, and PANoptosis-related signaling.

PFAS

Granzyme A participates in intestinal inflammation induced by PFOA through affecting PAR1/β-catenin/TBX3/IL24 pathway.

PFAS disrupt adult hippocampal neurogenesis and synaptic remodeling associated with NOX2/ROS/Ferroptosis activation.

Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) exposure alters developmental and metabolic gene expression in human hippocampal organoids.

Low-dose PFNA exposure exacerbates intestinal inflammation via caspase-11-dependent noncanonical NLRP3 inflammasome activation in macrophages.

Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) interferes with Cyp1a activity and dysregulates the aryl hydrocarbon receptor pathway in larval zebrafish (Danio rerio).

Environmental PFOA exposure and the risk of metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease: An integrated computational toxicology and multi-omics study.

Pesticides

Chlorpyrifos exposure induces inflammatory and immune dysregulation: An integrative in silico and in vitro analysis.

Network-based integrative analysis of multi-level regulatory mechanisms associated with glyphosate exposure.

5-HIAA alleviates lipid accumulation in rat liver caused by atrazine by promoting the activation of the AMPK/p38 signaling pathway.

Computational insights for target prioritization and pesticide effects on intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR).

Sex-specific cardiac remodeling and metabolic reprogramming in IUGR F2 fetuses following glyphosate or glyphosate-based herbicide exposure.

Agriculturally relevant pesticide exposure scenario induces early-life lipid metabolism disruption and physiological stress in Caiman latirostris.

Dose-Dependent Hepatic Alterations Following Glyphosate Exposure in Female Wistar Rats: Oxidative Stress, Intracellular Cyclic Nucleotide Alterations, Apoptosis, and VEGF.

Metals/Metalloids

Sex-Dependent Placental Neuroendocrine Disruption by Maternal Arsenic Exposure: From Neurotransmitter Dysregulation to Neurobehavioral Outcomes.

Microplastics/Nanomaterials

Microplastic fibers can alter viral disease severity, contingent on particle shape and exposure timing.

Polystyrene nanoplastics induce transient microglial activation via endolysosomal retention in the mouse cortex.

Tire Wear Chemicals

The tire antioxidant derivative 6PPD-quinone exacerbates IBD by targeting NR1H4-mediated lipid metabolism and mitochondrial dysfunction in human colon epithelial cells.

Exploring the targets and mechanisms of 6PPD-Q-induced cardiotoxicity: A network toxicology and molecular docking study.

Exposure/Environment Studies

Phthalates

Household food security and urinary phthalate metabolite concentrations among US adults: Evidence from NHANES 2003-2018.

PFAS

Evaluating the geographic distribution of rural PFAS contamination and potential dietary sources of exposure.

Analysis of ultra short-chain PFAS in urine: method development by LC-MS/MS and first human biomonitoring results from the German National Cohort (NAKO).

An investigation of per- and polyfluoroalkyl concentrations in dogs and cats with endocrine disorders.

Neutral and ionic PFAS in coastal Antarctica: Global context, diagnostic ratios, and implications for long-range atmospheric transport.

The occurrence of legacy per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) deposited along a latitudinal transect in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.

A comparison of Per and Polyfluoroalkyl-alkyl substances in aquatic macroinvertebrates from urban and non-urban streams in Victoria, Australia.

Metals/Metalloids

Residential Lead Service Lines and Child Blood Lead Levels in Flint, Michigan, 2010-2019

Air Pollution

How routine fragrance product use elevates indoor PM_2.5 exposure in London households.

Pharmaceuticals/Personal Care Products

Hidden Hazards: Nontargeted Chemical Analysis Reveals Widespread Contaminants and Mislabeling in Personal Care and Cleaning Products

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This list is not meant to be exhaustive, and generally does not include studies on detection, remediation, or treatment of EDCs. Industry-funded articles are included without notation. Note that journal publication dates may be different from dates added to PubMed. To see the searchable archives, please email me and ask to join the EDC Science Weekly group EDC_research@googlegroups.com. There are searchable archives. Compiled by Sarah Howard of Healthy Environment and Endocrine Disruptor Strategies (HEEDS), a program of Environmental Health Sciences.

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