Brief Communications
Nature 419, 895-896 (31 October 2002) | doi:10.1038/419895a
Herbicides: Feminization of male frogs in the wild
Tyrone Hayes, Kelly Haston, Mable Tsui, Anhthu Hoang, Cathryn Haeffele & Aaron Vonk
Atrazine is the most commonly used herbicide in the United States and probably in the world1. Here we investigate the effects of exposure to water-borne atrazine contamination on wild leopard frogs (Rana pipiens) in different regions of the United States and find that 10–92% of males show gonadal abnormalities such as retarded development and hermaphroditism. These results are supported by laboratory observations, which together highlight concerns over the biological effects of environmental atrazine on amphibians.
- Laboratory for Integrative Studies in Amphibian Biology, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, and Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720-3140, USA
Correspondence to: e-mail: Email: tyrone@socrates.berkeley.edu
