WASHINGTON — Male mice who were exposed as babies to BPA, a chemical common in canned foods and plastic containers, act more like females and are seen as less desirable mates, a US study showed Monday.
The findings could have implications for how BPA, or Bisphenol A, may affect human development and behavior, said the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“The BPA-exposed deer mice in our study look normal; there is nothing obviously wrong with them. Yet, they are clearly different,” said lead author Cheryl Rosenfeld at the University of Missouri.
“Females do not want to mate with BPA-exposed male deer mice, and BPA-exposed males perform worse on spatial navigation tasks that assess their ability to find female partners in the wild.”
