Educating the children - not quite what Mayor Thorley had in mind ...

Excerpt from Billings Gazette:

Teens examine effect of estrogen in water

6 April 2007

O.J. Simpson was the most aggressive of the bunch - until estrogen was added to his water.

Then, his lunging at his image in the mirror all but stopped and he no longer flared his gills at other fish. For a betta tropical fish, known for fighting other male bettas to the death, it was a radical change.

Mykal Eden and Joanita Mathews, both 17, couldn't help but feel sorry for him, but his change in behavior was what they were hoping for. As a science experiment, the two West High juniors introduced estrogen sulfate, and Bisphenol-A, an estrogen mimicker, to betta fish tanks to see if the chemicals would cause a change in behavior.

Their laid-back fish and all the work the girls did to get them that way earned first place at the recent Billings Clinic Science Expo regional science fair and an all-expenses-paid trip to the international science fair in Albuquerque.

Fifteen fish were used in the experiment. Five were exposed to estrogen sulfate, five were exposed to Bisphenol-A and five were used as a control group. All the tanks were labeled with an official number, but the girls ended up giving the fish names as they got to know them better and found that each had its own personality.

"We can remember their other names, but we gave them each pet names because it's really easier that way," Eden said.

Both estrogen sulfate and Bisphenol-A are found in some streams and groundwater, and have been shown to cause changes in fish reproductive systems, but no experiments have been done to see if the chemicals cause behavior changes.

Estrogen sulfate gets into groundwater primarily through human waste, specifically by women on birth control.

Bisphenol-A is a plastic manufacturing byproduct that is released into waterways.

Some white perch in the Great Lakes region have become asexual after exposure to Bisphenol-A in the streams there, and in Montana, estrogen sulfate has been linked to reproductive system mutations in fathead minnows.

Estrogen-contaminated water may even cause young girls to go into puberty at an early age.

Eden and Mathews didn't want to hurt the fish and wanted to simulate natural exposure to the chemicals, so they dissolved less than a tenth of a milligram of the chemicals in a liter of distilled water and added only a few drops ofthe solution to the 5-gallon jugs of clean water they used to fill the fishtanks.

"The tiny amount blew me away," Eden said. "Our biggest concern was that the small amount wouldn't have an effect."

To test aggression, they held mirrors in the water and counted the number of times the fish flared their gills.

"As long as the chemical is in their water system, their aggression goes down," Mathews said.The fish exposed to Bisphenol-A mellowed the most.

O.J. Simpson and all the other fish used for the experiment are on there bound now. Eden and Mathews stopped the estrogen drops and the fish are getting their fight back.

Eden and Mathews said the experiment has made them realize how fragile the environment is and how critical clean water is.

"It's the things you can't see that are having a big affect," Eden said."I think that if something isn't done about this, it's going to only get worse," Mathews said.

Though no positive link between Bisphenol-A contamination and the everyday use of plastics for eating and drinking has been made, it is a growing concern.

"It's something that's so overlooked," Mathews said.

See - Experiments are better than the Mayor marching us through the streets.