Glyphosate - HH-RA.org

Bibliography Tag: glyphosate

Mostafalou and Abdollahi, 2017

Sara Mostafalou and Mohammad Abdollahi, “Pesticides: an update of human exposure and toxicity,” Archives of Toxicology, February 2017, 91:2, DOI: 10.1007/s00204-016-1849-x.

ABSTRACT:

Pesticides are a family of compounds which have brought many benefits to mankind in the agricultural, industrial, and health areas, but their toxicities in both humans and animals have always been a concern. Regardless of acute poisonings which are common for some classes of pesticides like organophosphoruses, the association of chronic and sub-lethal exposure to pesticides with a prevalence of some persistent diseases is going to be a phenomenon to which global attention has been attracted. In this review, incidence of various malignant, neurodegenerative, respiratory, reproductive, developmental, and metabolic diseases in relation to different routes of human exposure to pesticides such as occupational, environmental, residential, parental, maternal, and paternal has been systematically criticized in different categories of pesticide toxicities like carcinogenicity, neurotoxicity, pulmonotoxicity, reproductive toxicity, developmental toxicity, and metabolic toxicity. A huge body of evidence exists on the possible role of pesticide exposures in the elevated incidence of human diseases such as cancers, Alzheimer, Parkinson, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, asthma, bronchitis, infertility, birth defects, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, autism, diabetes, and obesity. Most of the disorders are induced by insecticides and herbicides most notably organophosphorus, organochlorines, phenoxyacetic acids, and triazine compounds.

Schütte et al., 2017

Gesine Schütte, Michael Eckerstorfer, Valentina Rastelli, Wolfram Reichenbecher, Sara Restrepo‑Vassalli, Marja Ruohonen‑Lehto, Anne‑Gabrielle Wuest Saucy, and Martha Mertens, “Herbicide resistance and biodiversity: agronomic and environmental aspects of genetically modified herbicide-resistant plants,” Environmental Sciences Europe, 2017, 29:5, DOI: 10.1186/s12302-016-0100-y.

ABSTRACT:

Farmland biodiversity is an important characteristic when assessing sustainability of agricultural practices and is of major international concern. Scientific data indicate that agricultural intensification and pesticide use are among the main drivers of biodiversity loss. The analysed data and experiences do not support statements that herbicide-resistant crops provide consistently better yields than conventional crops or reduce herbicide amounts. They rather show that the adoption of herbicide-resistant crops impacts agronomy, agricultural practice, and weed management and contributes to biodiversity loss in several ways: (i) many studies show that glyphosate-based herbicides, which were commonly regarded as less harmful, are toxic to a range of aquatic organisms and adversely affect the soil and intestinal microflora and plant disease resistance; the increased use of 2,4-D or dicamba, linked to new herbicide-resistant crops, causes special concerns. (ii) The adoption of herbicide-resistant crops has reduced crop rotation and favoured weed management that is solely based on the use of herbicides. (iii) Continuous herbicide resistance cropping and the intensive use of glyphosate over the last 20 years have led to the appearance of at least 34 glyphosate-resistant weed species worldwide. Although recommended for many years, farmers did not counter resistance development in weeds by integrated weed management, but continued to rely on herbicides as sole measure. Despite occurrence of widespread resistance in weeds to other herbicides, industry rather develops transgenic crops with additional herbicide resistance genes. (iv) Agricultural management based on broad-spectrum herbicides as in herbicide-resistant crops further decreases diversity and abundance of wild plants and impacts arthropod fauna and other farmland animals. Taken together, adverse impacts of herbicide-resistant crops on biodiversity, when widely adopted, should be expected and are indeed very hard to avoid. For that reason, and in order to comply with international agreements to protect and enhance biodiversity, agriculture needs to focus on practices that are more environmentally friendly, including an overall reduction in pesticide use. (Pesticides are used for agricultural as well non-agricultural purposes. Most commonly they are used as plant protection products and regarded as a synonym for it and so also in this text.) FULL TEXT

Ranjbar et al., 2015

Mahsa Ranjbar, Michael A. Rotondi, Chris I. Ardern, and Jennifer L. Kuk, “The Influence of Urinary Concentrations of Organophosphate Metabolites on the Relationship between BMI and Cardiometabolic Health Risk,” Journal of Obesity, 2015, DOI: 10.1155/2015/687914

ABSTRACT:

The objective was to determine whether detectable levels of OP metabolites influence the relationship between BMI and cardiometabolic health. This cross-sectional study was conducted using 2227 adults from the 1999–2008 NHANES datasets. Urinary concentrations of six dialkyl phosphate metabolites were dichotomized to above and below the detection limit. Weighted multiple regression analysis was performed adjusting for confounding variables. Independent of BMI, individuals with detectable metabolites had higher diastolic blood pressure (for dimethylphosphate, diethylphosphate, and diethyldithiophosphate; ???? < 0.05), lower HDL (for diethyldithiophosphate; ???? = 0.02), and higher triglyceride (for dimethyldithiophosphate; ???? = 0.05) than those below detection. Contrarily, those with detectable dimethylthiophosphate had better LDL, HDL, and total cholesterol, independent of BMI. Individuals at a higher BMI range who had detectable diethylphosphate (interaction: ???? = 0.03) and diethylthiophosphate (interaction: ???? = 0.02) exhibited lower HDL, while little difference existed between OP metabolite detection statuses at lower BMIs. Similarly, individuals with high BMIs and detectable diethylphosphate had higher triglyceride than those without detectable levels, while minimal differences between diethylphosphate detection statuses were observed at lower BMIs (interaction: ???? = 0.02). Thus, cardiometabolic health outcome differs depending on the specific OP metabolite being examined, with higher BMIs amplifying health risk. FULL TEXT

Tsao et al., 2016

Yun-Chen Tsao, Yung-Chun Lai, Hsiu-Chuan Liu, Ray H. Liu, and Dong-Liang Lin, “Simultaneous Determination and Quantitation of Paraquat, Diquat, Glufosinate and Glyphosate,in Postmortem Blood and Urine by LC–MS-MS,” Journal of Analytical Toxicology, 40, 2016, DOI: 10.1093/jat/bkw042

ABSTRACT:

A simple method, incorporating protein-precipitation/organic backwashing and liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS-MS), has been successfully developed for the simultaneous analysis of four highly water-soluble and less volatile herbicides (paraquat, diquat, glufosinate and glyphosate) in ante- and postmortem blood, urine and gastric content samples. Respective isotopically labeled analogs of these analytes were adopted as internal standards. Acetonitrile and dichloromethane were used for protein precipitation and organic solvent backwashing, respectively, followed by injecting the upper aqueous phase into the LC–MS-MS system. Chromatographic separation was achieved using an Agilent Zorbax SB-Aq analytical column, with gradient elution of 15 mM heptafluorobutyric acid and acetonitrile. Mass spectrometric analysis was performed under electrospray ionization in positive-ion multiple reaction
monitoring mode. The precursor ions and the two transition ions (m/z) adopted for each of these four analytes were paraquat (185; 169 and 115), diquat (183; 157 and 78), glufosinate (182; 136 and 119) and glyphosate (170; 88 and 60), respectively. Analyte-free blood and urine samples, fortified with the analytes of interest, were used for method development/validation and yielded acceptable recoveries of the analytes; interday and intraday precision and accuracy data; calibration linearity and limits of detection and quantitation. This method was successfully incorporated into an overall analytical scheme, designed for the analysis of a broad range of compounds present in postmortem samples, helpful to medical examiners’ efforts to determine victims’ causes of death. FULL TEXT

Brändli et al., 2012

Dirk Brändli and Sandra Reinacher, “Herbicides found in Human Urine,” Ithaka Journal, 1/2012, 2012

SUMMARY:

Glyphosate is the main active substance used in most commercial herbicides. It poisons not only plants, but also animals and humans. When testing for glyphosate contamination in an urban population, a German university found significant contamination in all urine samples with levels 5 to 20 times above the legal limit for drinking water. Glyphosate background info, health risks, and reasons for contamination are discussed. FULL TEXT

Curwin et al., 2007

Brian Curwin, Misty Hein, Wayne Sanderson, Cynthia Striley, Dick Heederik, Hans Kromhout, Stephen Reynolds, Michael Alavanja, “Urinary Pesticide Concentrations Among Children, Mothers and Fathers Living in Farm and Non-Farm Households in Iowa,” The Annals of Occupational Hygiene, 51:1, January 2007, DOI: 10.1093/annhyg/mel062

ABSTRACT:

In the spring and summer of 2001, 47 fathers, 48 mothers and 117 children of Iowa farm and non-farm households were recruited to participate in a study investigating take-home pesticide exposure. On two occasions ∼1 month apart, urine samples from each participant and dust samples from various rooms were collected from each household and were analyzed for atrazine, metolachlor, glyphosate and chlorpyrifos or their metabolites. The adjusted geometric mean (GM) level of the urine metabolite of atrazine was significantly higher in fathers, mothers and children from farm households compared with those from non-farm households (P ≤ 0.0001). Urine metabolites of chlorpyrifos were significantly higher in farm fathers (P = 0.02) and marginally higher in farm mothers (P = 0.05) when compared with non-farm fathers and mothers, but metolachlor and glyphosate levels were similar between the two groups. GM levels of the urinary metabolites for chlorpyrifos, metolachlor and glyphosate were not significantly different between farm children and non-farm children. Farm children had significantly higher urinary atrazine and chlorpyrifos levels (P = 0.03 and P = 0.03 respectively) when these pesticides were applied by their fathers prior to sample collection than those of farm children where these pesticides were not recently applied. Urinary metabolite concentration was positively associated with pesticide dust concentration in the homes for all pesticides except atrazine in farm mothers; however, the associations were generally not significant. There were generally good correlations for urinary metabolite levels among members of the same family. FULL TEXT

Sanin et al., 2009

Sanin LH, Carrasquilla G, Solomon KR, Cole DC, Marshall EJ., “Regional differences in time to pregnancy among fertile women from five Colombian regions with different use of glyphosate,” Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, Part A, 72: 15-16, 2009, DOI: 10.1080/15287390902929691

ABSTRACT:

The objective of this study was to test whether there was an association between the use of glyphosate when applied by aerial spray for the eradication of illicit crops (cocaine and poppy) and time to pregnancy (TTP) among fertile women. A retrospective cohort study (with an ecological exposure index) of first pregnancies was undertaken in 2592 fertile Colombian women from 5 regions with different uses of glyphosate. Women were interviewed regarding potential reproductive, lifestyle, and work history predictors of TTP, which was measured in months. Fecundability odds ratios (fOR) were estimated using a discrete time analogue of Cox’s proportional hazard model. There were differences in TTP between regions. In the final multivariate model, the main predictor was the region adjusted by irregular relationship with partner, maternal age at first pregnancy, and, marginally, coffee consumption and self-perception of water pollution. Boyaca, a region with traditional crops and. recently, illicit crops without glyphosate eradication spraying (manual eradication), displayed minimal risk and was the reference region. Other regions, including Sierra Nevada (control area, organic agriculture), Putumayo and Narino (illicit crops and intensive eradication spray program), and Valle del Cauca, demonstrated greater risk of longer TTP, with the highest risk for Valle del Cauca (fOR 0.15, 95% CI 0.12, 0.18), a sugar-cane region with a history of use of glyphosate and others chemicals for more than 30 yr. The reduced fecundability in some regions was not associated with the use of glyphosate for eradication spraying. The observed ecological differences remain unexplained and may be produced by varying exposures to environmental factors, history of contraceptive programs in the region, or psychological distress. Future studies examining these or other possible causes are needed.

Bolognesi et al., 1997

Claudia Bolognesi, Stefania Bonatti, Paolo Degan, Elena Gallerani, Marco Peluso, Roberta Rabboni, Paola Roggieri, and Angelo Abbondandolo, “Genotoxic Activity of Glyphosate and Its Technical Formulation Roundup,” Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 45, 1997, DOI: 10.1021/jf9606518

ABSTRACT:

Glyphosate (N-phosphonomethylglycine) is an effective herbicide acting on the synthesis of aromatic amino acids in plants. The genotoxic potential of this herbicide has been studied: the results available in the open literature reveal a weak activity of the technical formulation. In this study, the formulated commercial product, Roundup, and its active agent, glyphosate, were tested in the same battery of assays for the induction of DNA damage and chromosomal effects in vivoand in vitro. Swiss CD1 mice were treated intraperitoneally with test substances, and the DNA damage was evaluated by alkaline elution technique and 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) quantification in liver and kidney. The chromosomal damage of the two pesticide preparations was also evaluated in vivo in bone marrow of mice as micronuclei frequency and in vitro in human lymphocyte culture as SCE frequency. A DNA-damaging activity as DNA single-strand breaks and 8-OHdG and a significant increase in chromosomal alterations were observed with both substances in vivo and in vitro. A weak increment of the genotoxic activity was evident using the technical formulation. FULL TEXT

Dallegrave et al., 2003

Eliane Dallegrave, Fabiana DiGiorgio Mantese, Ricardo Soares Coelho, Janaı´na Drawans Pereira, Paulo Roberto Dalsenter, Augusto Langeloh, “The teratogenic potential of the herbicide glyphosate-Roundup in Wistar rats,” Toxicology Letters, 142, 2003, DOI: 10.1016/S0378-4274(02)00483-6.

ABSTRACT:

The aim of this study was to assess the teratogenicity of the herbicide glyphosate-Roundup† (as commercialized in Brazil) to Wistar rats. Dams were treated orally with water or 500, 750 or 1000 mg/kg glyphosate from day 6 to 15 of pregnancy. Cesarean sections were performed on day 21 of pregnancy, and number of corpora lutea, implantation sites, living and dead fetuses, and resorptions were recorded. Weight and gender of the fetuses were determined, and fetuses
were examined for external malformations and skeletal alterations. The organs of the dams were removed and weighed. Results showed a 50% mortality rate for dams treated with 1000 mg/kg glyphosate. Skeletal alterations were observed in 15.4, 33.1, 42.0 and 57.3% of fetuses from the control, 500, 750 and 1000 mg/kg glyphosate groups, respectively. We may conclude that glyphosate-Roundup† is toxic to the dams and induces developmental retardation of the fetal
skeleton. FULL TEXT

Robinson et al., 2012

CJ Robinson, M Antoniou, MEM Habib, CV Howard, RC Jennings, C Leifert, RO Nodari, and J Fagan, “Teratogenic Effects of Glyphosate-Based Herbicides: Divergence of Regulatory Decisions from Scientific Evidence,” Environmental and Analytical Toxicology, S:4, 2012, DOI: 10.4172/2161-0525.S4-006.

ABSTRACT:

The publication of a study in 2010, showing that a glyphosate herbicide formulation and glyphosate alone caused malformations in the embryos of Xenopus laevis and chickens through disruption of the retinoic acid signalling pathway, caused scientific and regulatory controversy. Debate centred on the effects of the production and consumption of genetically modified Roundup Ready® soy, which is engineered to tolerate applications of glyphosate herbicide. The study, along with others indicating teratogenic and reproductive effects from glyphosate herbicide exposure, was rebutted by the German Federal Office for Consumer Protection and Food Safety, BVL, as well as in industry-sponsored papers. These rebuttals relied partly on unpublished industry-sponsored studies commissioned for regulatory purposes, which, it was claimed, showed that glyphosate is not a teratogen or reproductive toxin.

However, examination of the German authorities’ draft assessment report on the industry studies, which underlies glyphosate’s EU authorisation, revealed further evidence of glyphosate’s teratogenicity. Many of the malformations found were of the type defined in the scientific literature as associated with retinoic acid teratogenesis. Nevertheless, the German and EU authorities minimized these findings in their assessment and set a potentially unsafe acceptable daily intake (ADI) level for glyphosate. This paper reviews the evidence on the teratogenicity and reproductive toxicity of glyphosate herbicides and concludes that a new and transparent risk assessment needs to be conducted. The new risk assessment must take into account all the data on the toxicity of glyphosate and its commercial formulations, including data generated by independent scientists and published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, as well as the industry-sponsored studies. FULL TEXT

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