Sex Change Effect of GM Weedkiller

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Monday, 04 November 2002

Farmers growing a variety of GM maize in the US have resorted to a powerful herbicide called atrazine because of increased weed resistance and the spread of volunteer plants. Now Tyrone Hayes, an endocrinologist at the University of California, has found evidence to suggest that the widespread use of atrazine is changing the sex of frogs in the wild. Hayes studied populations of leopard frogs that commonly breed next to corn fields, and which are particularly vulnerable to a build-up of atrazine running off from the crops. He found that some of the male frogs have become hermaphrodites. What is unusual is the extremely low concentrations of atrazine that appear to have an effect, an observation that the manufacturer, Syngenta, disputes.
Source: New Scientist via Soil Association