What do you know about your endocrine system? Possibly not as much as you should, seeing as how almost every organ and cell in the body is affected by it. This under-appreciated collection of glands selects and removes materials from the blood, processes them and secretes the finished chemical products, or hormones, back into the bloodstream.

Alongside the day’s high and low temperatures, weather reports generally contain a UV alert for a particular time. But what does it actually mean – and what should you do about it?

Researchers report that the children of mothers who experienced higher levels of exposure to perfluorooctanoic acid while pregnant had higher body fat and faster weight gain through age 8. The participants live downstream from a chemical plant that used PFOA.

"It's kind of ironic. In our laboratory, working with carbon nanotubes, we wear facemasks to prevent exactly what we're seeing in these samples, yet everyone walking around out there in the world probably has at least a small concentration of carbon nanotubes in their lungs," says Lon Wilson.

Mercury pollution is one of the most insidious problems in our environment. Today my colleagues and I at Flinders University have unveiled a new material than can scrub mercury from the environment, as a result of research to be published this week.

We all know about the obvious dangers of DIY and construction work – smashed thumbs, stubbed toes and so on. Even hanging wallpaper results in 1,500 British people going to hospital every year.

Over the past ten years in the United States, unconventional gas and oil drilling using hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has experienced a meteoric increase. Since well drilling requires an influx of water, materials and workers into yotherwise rural and remote areas, the question has been: could air, water and noise pollution negatively impact on the health of nearby residents?

Recent research has reignited concerns that exposure to chemicals from plastics might be to blame for low sperm counts in young men. I share the concerns about the high prevalence of low sperm counts (one in six young men), and my research is directed at trying to identify what causes it. But whether plastics are to blame isn’t a simple matter.

Exposure to air pollutants during pregnancy may contribute to childhood abnormalities in the brain, a new study suggests. The research, from the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles, measured the exposure of the mothers to PAH air pollution and used brain imaging to look at the effects on their children’s brains.

We all suffer from too little sleep from time to time, some more than others. There are many possible reasons, depending on our age, genes and sleep habits; but another possible culprit is using technology before going to sleep.

Environmental chemicals are wreaking havoc to last a lifetime. 10 to 15 percent of all babies born in the U.S. have some type of neurobehavorial development disorder. Still more are affected by neurological disorders that don’t rise to the level of clinical diagnosis.

Purchase a plastic water bottle, and there’s a good chance that it will feature a “BPA-free” label. You might be seeing it more often because the industrial chemical Bisphenol-A has now been removed from a wide array of products.

As average temperatures rise an increasing global population – with many more elderly people – is going to be more vulnerable to extreme weather, UK scientists say.

Bad news for hay fever and asthma sufferers as US researchers demonstrate that man-made rises in CO₂ emissions could lead to a 200% increase in the levels of pollen from grasses.

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Recent analyses raise disturbing questions about the health and environmental effects of the stuff that encases our edibles.

Today, chemicals comprise the backbone of our modern lifestyle and are the largest sector of our economy. We generate 300 billion pounds of synthetic chemicals each year in the U.S. alone, and an average American uses more than 1,500 pounds of chemical products. Synthetic chemicals are poisoning our bodies...

Toxicologists have a saying: “The dose makes the poison.” In other words, there is no such thing as “toxic” or “non-toxic” — it always depends on how much of a substance you consume.

On a low, windswept rise at the southeastern edge of the Navajo Nation, Jackie Bell-Jefferson prepares to move her family from their home. A mound of uranium-laden waste the size of several football fields, covered with a thin veneer of gravel, dominates the view from her front door...

It would seem, and particularly for mothers, fathers, and grandparents everywhere, that using plastics for anything other than decorations is not at all wise. Just what would be your decision if you knew that what you were feeding your children, or your grandchildren, might one day lead to...

As a new report highlights the link between warming waters and mercury pollution, scientists fear for contamination to the marine food chain. Scientists in the US say they have found evidence suggesting that warmer sea surface temperatures may increase the ability of fish to accumulate mercury.

The health risks of leaded gasoline are a thing of the past, right? Wrong. When the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality surveyed the airport in 2005, it found a lead cloud hovering above Hillsboro, a circular plume spanning 25 square miles. At its center lead levels were twice as high as the National Ambient Air Quality Standard threshold...

Our primal mind has no defense against the stressful world it now faces, and we are paying a terrifying price for it. The toll this takes is insidious as well as profound, and it must be appreciated if steps are to be taken to mitigate its effects...

Many older people in the U. S. population were chronically exposed to lead from paint and gasoline prior to the 1980s. To date, most of the research on lead and cognitive functioning in older age has focused on men, despite the fact that women live longer on average and therefore may be more likely to develop dementia over the course of their life span.