Xenoestrogens, pollution & health: a critical review

This review article provides basic information concerning the xenoestrogens (i.e. the sexual hormone mimetic or disruptive compounds) in a perspective willingly selective of the recent literature. In the second part, a hypothetical link between xenoestrogens and disturbances of the central nervous system is considered with respect to steroids more directly involved in the CNS, i.e. the neurosteroids. The data accumulated so far on xenoestrogens present in the environment and their possible competition for membrane-bound neurosteroid receptor sites lend support to the working hypothesis that human behaviour could be affected in the daily life by exposure to chemical pollutants.