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Pollution may damage polar bear penile bones
Brian Galloway for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
To put it plainly: human activity makes life difficult for polar bears. Climate change is destroying their habitat and dictating their diet. And now, as it turns out, we’re also hurting their penises.
Well, our pollutants are hurting their penises, that is.
Christian Sonne, professor in Veterinary Ecotoxicology and Wildlife Health at Aarhus University in Denmark, and his team connected high levels of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) with low baculum (penile bone) density. PCBs were used for decades in industrial electrical equipment, but have since been banned throughout much of the world due to health concerns.
The researchers used the baculum because, well, they’re easy to find.
“It’s the kind of bone that’s taken by local trophy hunters and subsistence hunters. It’s an actual sign that you have hunted and shot a bear,” reports Sonne to NewScientist.
The researchers compared penile bone density with the area’s historical pollution data. They found a connection between PCB concentration and baculum density, but admit that the results aren’t strong enough to prove definitive causation.
Scientists have yet to fully uncover the baculum’s function (probably because it’s tough to study half-ton bears during sex), but Sonne adds that, “If it breaks, you probably won’t have a bear [that] can copulate.”
The team now wants to pursue a connection between pollutants and evolutionary change. They believe that PCBs and other chemicals have killed many bears and forced genetic change in the population.
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Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113321863/pollution-may-damage-polar-bear-penile-bones-012715/
