Environmental Health Perspectives articles from August 2008

Environmental Health Perspectives archives from August 2008

EHP'S new manuscript submission system.(Editorial)(Editorial)
August 1, 2008... In the May 2008 issue of EHP, I indicated in the editorial "Recent Changes at Environmental Health Perspectives" that we were planning to implement a new web-based manuscript submission and tracking system. I am pleased to announce that, as of...

Error and bias in geocoding school and students' home addresses.(Correspondence)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2008... Zandbergen and Green (2007) recently described the effect of positional error on the distance between geocoded addresses and major roads, an often-used proxy for traffic-related exposures. They found a 200-500 m range of mean positional errors...

Geocoding school and student's home addresses: Zandbergen responds.(Correspondence)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2008... Our research (Zandbergen and Green 2007) strongly suggests that the positional error in street geocoding is not random in direction and that the displacement along the street segment often occurs toward one side of the street because of...

Defective spermatogenesis in cryptorchid testes: cause or effect?(Correspondence)
August 1, 2008... Martin et al. (2008) recently published their quantitative meta-analysis focusing on the estrogen hypothesis of testicular dysgenesis syndrome. I congratulate the authors on their thorough review and excellent summary of the existing...

Defective spermatogenesis Martin et al. respond.(Correspondence)
August 1, 2008... In response to Prasad's constructive comments on our quantitative meta-analysis of the estrogen hypothesis and testicular dysgenesis syndrome (Martin et al. 2008), we offer the following observations regarding the scope of our study and...

Floral scents going off the air?(AIR POLLUTION)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Would a flower by any other name always smell as sweet? Maybe not, if air pollution has anything to do with it. Researchers at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville report that three common constituents of smog destroy floral scents...

The sprawl of food deserts.(URBAN ISSUES)(Report)
August 1, 2008... The North American urban landscape has changed considerably over the past few decades with the advent of the automobile as the transportation mode of choice, Privatized mobility allowed wealthier people to move outward from city centers toward...

EPA-China Environmental Law Initiative.(ehpnet)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... China's recent rapid economic expansion has created an array of serious environmental problems for that country, which Chinese officials are working to rectify with a solid environmental law framework, But implementing such laws is not always...

Nano-food chain link examined.(NANOTECHNOLOGY)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Engineered nanomaterials--materials and even machines constructed on a nanometer scale--have enormous potential in everything from electronics to textiles to medicine. Although nanomaterials are being manufactured in ever greater numbers,...

Will Beijing clean up in time?(The Beat)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... When Beijing made its bid in 2001 to become an Olympic host city, the city assured the International Olympic Committee that it would meet WHO standards for air pollution by the time the games commenced. As the event gears up for its August 2008...

Microbes heat up.(The Beat)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... Microbes perform a range of critical functions, such as helping regulate oxygen and greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, fixing nitrogen in soils required for plant growth, and converting waste matter to nutrients. Researchers reported at the...

Rice not so nice for babies?(The Beat)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... In many areas of the world, babies are weaned from the breast or bottle onto rice cereal and other rice-based foods. A study in volume 152, issue 3 (2008) of Environmental Pollution finds that rice foods sold in Western supermarkets can contain...

Lead in artificial turf.(The Beat)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... Environmental health advocates have recently begun to question the safety of artificial turf fields [see "Synthetic Turf: Health Debate Takes Root," EHP 116:A116-122 (2008)]. Now, after testing in New Jersey revealed high levels of lead on some...

Globalization and food safety.(The Beat)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... The United States is increasingly importing more of its food--approximately 15% in 2006--from developing countries, which researchers at the June 2008 general meeting of the American Society for Microbiology warn have lower sanitary food...

Dirt cheap lighting for Africa.(The Beat)(Brief article)
August 1, 2008... With only 26% of people in Africa having access to grid-based electricity, many of the continent's population rely on dangerous and increasingly expensive kerosene lamps and candles for lighting. A new fuel cell system, one of the winners of...

In search of a better mosquito repellent.(PESTICIDES)
August 1, 2008... Insect bites are more than just an itchy nuisance; mosquitoes and ticks spread malaria, West Nile virus, Lyme disease, and other illnesses. The insect repellent DEET keeps insects away, but it wears off with sweat and can cause health problems...

The global sweep of pollution: satellite snapshots capture long-distance movement.(Focus)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Towering smokestacks were a popular mid-twentieth-century "remedy" for industrial emissions. Pump the stuff high enough into the air, went the thinking, and the problem would to away. But evidence collected since then has strongly suggested...

Recovering the good earth: China's growing organic market.(Spheres of Influence)(Report)
August 1, 2008... People whose impressions of Chinese food exports are colored by reports of contaminated pet food or pesticide-laced dumplings might not expect China to have much of an organic market. They would be wrong. According to "The Greening of China's...

Gastronomical delight: micronutrients protect against arsenic lesions.(Science Selection)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Studies in South Asia suggest that antioxidants may mediate many of the dermatologic symptoms associated with exposure to arsenic in drinking water. Nonetheless, the mitigating effects of diet on arsenic-related premalignant skin lesions are...

Tracking down a cause for hypospadias: placental malfunction may contribute.(Science Selection)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Hypospadias is a male birth defect in which the opening of the urethra is located on the underside of the penis instead of the tip. Although the defect is common and increasing in prevalence (2-8 cases per 1,000 live births in Western...

Getting straight on what's flushed: "sewage epidemiology" measures community drug consumption.(Science Selection)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Active pharmaceutical agents and other chemicals in sewage pose a considerable concern when one considers the potential for inadvertent exposures through treated water. On the flip side, wastewater can also provide a wealth of economical and...

Alternative mechanism for PFOA? Trout studies shed light on liver effects.(Perfluorooctanoic acid)(Science Selection)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), used to make a class of industrial chemicals that are widely used in products such as textile coatings and flame retardants, is known to be a potent hepatocarcinogen in rodents. Until now the only mechanism of...

Children are likely to suffer most from our fossil fuel addiction.(Commentary)(Report)
August 1, 2008... BACKGROUND: The periods of fetal and child development arguably represent the stages of greatest vulnerability to the dual impacts of fossil fuel combustion: the multiple toxic effects of emitted pollutants (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons,...

Integrating human health into environmental impact assessment: an unrealized opportunity for environmental health and justice.(Report)
August 1, 2008... OBJECTIVES: The National Environmental Policy Act and related state laws require many public agencies to analyze and disclose potentially significant environmental effects of agency actions, including effects on human health. In this paper we...

Pentachlorophenol and cancer risk: focusing the lens on specific chlorophenols and contaminants.(Report)
August 1, 2008... OBJECTIVE: Pentachlorophenol, a fungicide widely used as a wood preservative, was classified in 1999 by the International Agency for Research on Cancer as a possible human carcinogen. We reviewed currently available data to determine the extent...

Correction.(Correction notice)
August 1, 2008... In the manuscript originally published online, data were missing from Figure 3; the figure has been corrected here.

Effects of exposure to 0.06 ppm Ozone on [FEV.sub.1] in humans:a secondary analysis of existing data.(Research)(Report)
August 1, 2008... BACKGROUND: Ozone is a potent photochemical oxidant that produces transient, reversible decrements in the lung function of acutely exposed individuals. A recent study provided previously unavailable clinical data for 30 healthy young adults...

Estimating community drug abuse by wastewater analysis.(Research)(Report)
August 1, 2008... BACKGROUND: The social and medical problems of drug abuse are a matter of increasing global concern. To tackle drug abuse in changing scenarios, international drug agencies need fresh methods to monitor trends and patterns of illicit drug...

Adverse cardiovascular effects with acute particulate matter and ozone exposures: interstrain variation in mice.(Research)(Report)
August 1, 2008... OBJECTIVES: Increased ambient particulate matter (PM) levels are associated with cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, as shown by numerous epidemiology studies. Few studies have investigated the role of copollutants, such as ozone, in this...

Computational toxicology of chloroform: reverse dosimetry using Bayesian inference, Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation, and human biomonitoring data.(Research)(Report)
August 1, 2008... BACKGROUND: One problem of interpreting population-based biomonitoring data is the reconstruction of corresponding external exposure in cases where no such data are available. OBJECTIVES: We demonstrate the use of a computational framework...

Correction.(Correction notice)
August 1, 2008... In the abstract of the original manuscript published online, the units for chloroform exposures in tap water were presented as milligrams per liter instead of micrograms per liter. They have been corrected here.

Relation between cord blood mercury Levels and early Child development in a World Trade Center cohort.(Children's Health)(Report)
August 1, 2008... OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to determine whether prenatal mercury exposure, including potential releases from the World Trade Center (WTC) disaster, adversely affects fetal growth and child development. METHODS: We determined...

Methodologic issues and approaches to spatial epidemiology.(Mini-Monograph)(Report)
August 1, 2008... Spatial epidemiology is increasingly being used to assess health risks associated with environmental hazards. Risk patterns tend to have both a temporal and a spatial component; thus, spatial epidemiology must combine methods from epidemiology,...

Correction.(Correction notice)
August 1, 2008... In the manuscript originally published online, Figure 4C was incorrect; it has been corrected here.

Comparison of different methods for spatial analysis of cancer data in Utah.(Mini-Monograph)(Report)
August 1, 2008... BACKGROUND: The standardized incidence ratio (SIR) and SaTScan software are used by the Environmental Epidemiology Program (EEP), Utah Department of Health, to investigate health concerns and exposures in Utah (USA). Recendy, the EEP acquired...

Community-and individual-level socioeconomic status and breast cancer risk: multilevel modeling on Cape Cod, Massachusetts.(Mini-Monograph)(Report)
August 1, 2008... BACKGROUND: Previous research demonstrated increased risk of breast cancer associated with higher socioeconomic status (SES) measured at both the individual and community levels. However, little attention has been paid to simultaneously...

2008.(Calendar)
August 1, 2008... August 12-14 August, Tue-Thu. 9th ICCPA International Conference on Carbonaceous Particles in the Atmosphere, Berkeley. California. Information: Cindy Tast, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 1 Cyclotron Road, Mail Stop 90K, Berkeley,...

New Books.(Announcements)
August 1, 2008... Acid Rain in the Adirondacks: An Environmental History Jerry Jenkins, Karen Roy, Charles Driscoll, Christopher Buerkett Ithaca, NY:Cornell University Press, 2007. 256 pp. ISBN: 978-0-8014-4651-1, $65 A Dictionary of Biology,...