Steroids and endocrine disruptors--History, recent state of art and open questions
Abstract
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the levels and sites at which endocrine disruptors (EDs) affect steroid actions. In contrast to the special issue of Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology published three years ago and devoted to EDs as such, this paper focuses on steroids. We tried to point to more recent findings and opened questions. EDs interfere with steroid biosynthesis and metabolism either as inhibitors of relevant enzymes, or at the level of their expression. Particular attention was paid to enzymes metabolizing steroid hormones to biologically active products in target cells, such as aromatase, 5α-reductase and 3β-, 11β- and 17β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenases. An important target for EDs is also steroid acute regulatory protein (StAR), responsible for steroid precursor trafficking to mitochondria. EDs influence receptor-mediated steroid actions at both genomic and non-genomic levels. The remarkable differences in response to various steroid-receptor ligands led to a more detailed investigation of events following steroid/disruptor binding to the receptors and to the mapping of the signaling cascades and nuclear factors involved. A virtual screening of a large array of EDs with steroid receptors, known as in silico methods (≡computer simulation), is another promising approach for studying quantitative structure activity relationships and docking. New data may be expected on the effect of EDs on steroid hormone binding to selective…
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