Measurement of Estrogenic Activity with NRL/TIF2-BAP Assay

Abstract

A Nuclear Receptor Ligand (NRL) /TIF2-BAP assay combined with the solid phase extraction procedure with silica cartridge clean-up shows high sensitivity in determination of E1,E2, and E3 without inhibition of color nor natural organic matter. The values of relative binding affinity of E1,E3, BPA and NP, which is defined as the relative estrogenic activity compared with E2 were 1.7, 2.7, 0.018 and 0.015, respectively, based on the unit with nM. Acceptable recovery efficiencies (>60%) were obtained from the experiments spiked with E2 in sewage effluent with C.V. less than 20%. However, in the NRL/TIF2-BAP assay and sum of individual EDC activity measured by GC-MS analysis, it is shown that there is no significant difference between results obtained in the Expo demonstration plant, advanced sewage treatment processes, and through ozonation of primary effluent, except in their original sewage samples. It is concluded that NRL/TIF2-BAP assay is useful to evaluate estrogenic activity in environmental water and sewage treatment. Key Words : NRL/TIF2-BAP assay, endocrine-disrupting chemicals, estrogenicity, estrone, 17β-estradiol.