Environmental pollutants: an immunoendocrine perspective on phthalates

Abstract

Phthalates are endocrine disrupting compounds (EDCs) used as plasticizers in a wide array of daily-use products, from flooring and automotive parts to medical devices and are even present in the children´s toys. Since these compounds are not covalently bound other molecules, they leach from these synthetic products, causing a high level of human exposure to them. EDCs exert several endocrine effects, most typically, reduced biosynthesis of the male hormone, testosterone and disturbances in estrogen, androgen, PPAR-gamma and AhR that control complex immunoendocrine regulatory networks. Besides impacting the developmental processes and long-term adverse effects, since cells of the immune system express endocrine receptors, and synthetize and respond to several hormones and other endocrine ligands, phthalates also cause dysregulation of immune system.

Keywords

• phthalates
• immunomodulation
• immune
• endocrine
• disruptor
• edc
• review