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Science Saturday: BPA linked to immune cell activation in female mice
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In a new study, researchers on Mayo Clinic’s Florida campus found that exposing female mice to the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) increased their risk of myocarditis, a rare inflammatory heart disease usually triggered by a virus.
BPA is commonly found in plastic food and beverage containers; people can ingest BPA when it seeps into what they eat and drink. The Food and Drug Administration states that BPA is safe at the low levels that occur in these exposures. But some concerns remain: for example, people with higher exposures such as workers in plastic-related manufacturing jobs or sales clerks handling BPA-coated receipts could be at risk of adverse effects to the endocrine system.
“We began this study because we know that sex hormones influence the development of myocarditis, so we wanted to explore whether an endocrine disruptor such as BPA could play a role,” says principal investigator DeLisa Fairweather, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic cardiovascular researcher.
Read the rest of the article on Discovery's Edge.
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