Special issue on endocrine disruption and reproductive health.

Abstract

It is our pleasure to introduce to our readers a special thematic issue of Andrology. This is the third of such publications, following one special issue focused on genetic aspects of male infertility (Krausz & Carell, 2014) and another comprising papers on basic and clinical aspects of testicular germ cell cancer (Rajpert-De Meyts et al., 2015). The current issue is devoted to the timely topic of endocrine disruption and the role of this mechanism in the pathogenesis of increasingly widespread reproductive disorders. This is a very important issue that remains to be hotly debated in scientific and political circles due to conflicting interests from chemical and pharmacological industry, agriculture, governmental committees as well as NGOs and consumer organizations. On the one hand, many compounds have immensely contributed to protecting our health (e.g. from pests) and facilitating daily life. On the other hand, some of the commonly used chemicals turned out to have unexpected negative effects on other aspects of our health, with the endocrine system particularly vulnerable. The debate has been additionally fueled by conflicting data from research labs working on different species and often using doses not reflecting the real exposure. Despite these controversies, the field has been expanding because of the constant stream of newly identified endocrine disrupters and novel pathways they affect. The current status of the field is nicely summarized in the editorial opening this issue (Andersson et al., 2016). The content of this special issue highlights some of the pertinent topics in the field of endocrine disruption that are of relevance to andrologists and researchers interested in male reproduction. However, the issue also contains a few articles that deal with female reproduction and neuroendocrinology. Most of the articles are based on lectures presented at the 8th Copenhagen Workshop on Endocrine Disrupters, held in May 2015. These meetings have grown to be the preeminent gathering of leading experts in the field that sets a tone for research in the field. We are proud that Andrology participates in the dissemination of data presented at this and other ‘cutting-edge’ meetings. We have also added a handful of thematically matching papers submitted to Andrology independently of the meeting. All papers in this special issue underwent a usual stringent review process according to the journal's standard. The issue has been edited by a guest associate editor, Anna-Maria Andersson, the main organizer of the Copenhagen meeting, and the director of the Danish Center for Endocrine Disrupters (www.cend.dk), founded by the Danish Ministry of Environment, which also supported the meeting financially. She was helped by members of the Programme Committee, Katrine Bay, Hanne Frederiksen, and Niels E. Skakkebæk, as well as Kenneth Grigor, who edited the meeting comments included in some of the papers. We are grateful for their contribution, and hope that our readers will find the issue interesting.