[Research advance on environmental exposure and ecotoxicological effects of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs)]

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are a group of new type organic pollutants with significant ecological risk. As flame retardants, they have been increasingly added to industrial products, and thus, resulted in more and more extensive pollution of air, water, sediment and soil as well as their relevant ecosystems. In view of the new environmental problem and based on limited available data, this paper approached the anthropogenic sources of PBDEs and their pathways of environmental exposure, and gave the possible occurrence and concentration of PBDEs in several living organisms and different human tissues. The toxic effects and ecological influences of PBDEs acting on animals and human beings, and their potential biological accumulation and magnification in ecosystems were analyzed in the aspects of hypothyroid, neurotoxicity, and reproductive and developmental toxicity, and the pivots of further researches on environmental exposure, ecological effects and human health influences of PBDEs were thus suggested.