In a study published in the Environmental Health Perspective, a research team made up of scientists from across the country have found that environmentally relevant exposure to toxins found in algal blooms posed a risk to women’s reproductive health by heightening the probability of irregular menstrual cycles and infertility related to ovulatory disorders.
Saurabh Chatterjee, PhD, professor of environmental and occupational health at the UC Irvine Program in Public Health and professor of medicine at the UC Irvine School of Medicine, served as a co-author on the publication with corresponding author, Shuo Xia, PhD from Rutgers University and is available for interview.
In marine and freshwater ecosystems, there is a dangerous phenomenon occurring that causes adverse health effects in humans and wildlife animals. Around the globe, large swaths of harmful cyanobacterial (or more commonly referred to as algal) blooms have been cropping up more frequently, primarily owing to the global temperature rise caused by climate change and human behavior like agricultural runoff and urbanization. Humans are exposed to this harmful microcystins via drinking water, food, algal dietary supplements, and recreational activities in polluted waters. These toxins are not routinely monitored due to the absence of federal/state regulatory guidelines, and conventional water treatments cannot completely remove dissolved cyanobacterial toxins.
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