PNNL

Abstract

Biomonitoring of human exposure to estrogens most frequently focuses on environmental and dietary estrogens, and infrequently includes measures of exposure to potent endogenous estrogens present in serum. Pregnancy is a developmentally sensitive period during which “added” serum estrogenicity exceeding normal intra-individual daily variability is of particular concern. Developing non-invasive biomonitoring methods for estrogens would overcome a key barrier to assessing the potential for biologically significant “added” estrogenicity . We collected repeated measures of serum concentrations of estrone (E1), estradiol (E2), estriol (E3), estetrol (E4), daidzein (DDZ), genistein (GEN) and bisphenol A (BPA) in thirty pregnant women using ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry detection (UPLC-MS/MS) and electrospray ionization (ESI). Serum estrone, estradiol and estriol concentrations varied significantly, with broad ranges across the cohort: 1.61-85.1 nM, 9.09-69.7 nM, and 1.5-36.3 nM respectively. BPA, DDZ and GEN concentrations were 1-5 orders of magnitude lower. The median within-individual coefficients of variation were large, 10.3% for estrone, 9.1% for estradiol, and 9.7% for estriol. The median serum estrone concentration was poorly correlated with gestation period but correlation with gestation period (log concentrations) increased with hydroxylation of the estrogens, tau=0.45 (estradiol), tau=0.58 (estriol) with p values