Because bisphenol A (BPA) is a high production volume chemical, we examined over 500 peer-reviewed studies to understand its global distribution in effluent discharges, surface waters, sewage sludge, biosolids, sediments, soils, air, wildlife, and humans. Bisphenol A was largely reported from urban ecosystems in Asia, Europe, and North America; unfortunately, information was lacking from large geographic areas, megacities, and developing countries. When sufficient data were available, probabilistic hazard assessments were performed to understand global environmental quality concerns. Exceedances of Canadian Predicted No Effect Concentrations for aquatic life were >50% for effluents in Asia, Europe, and North America but as high as 80% for surface water reports from Asia. Similarly, maximum concentrations of BPA in sediments from Asia were higher than Europe. Concentrations of BPA in wildlife, mostly for fish, ranged from 0.2 to 13 000 ng/g. We observed 60% and 40% exceedences of median levels by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey in Europe and Asia, respectively. These findings highlight the utility of coordinating global sensing of environmental contaminants efforts through integration of environmental monitoring and specimen banking to identify regions for implementation of more robust environmental assessment and management programs.

Prymnesium parvum Carter is a mixotrophic haptophyte which, under certain environmental conditions, produces potent toxins responsible for fish kills around the world since the 1930s. Many P. parvum blooms have occurred in catchments where crop agriculture is a dominant land use; however, the effects of herbicides on bloom dynamics have not yet been investigated. Aquatic microbial communities containing P. parvum were subjected to two separate experiments involving the addition of either atrazine or glyphosate at varying concentrations. After 14, 21, and 28 days at 10 μg/l atrazine we observed that the relative abundance of P. parvum was significantly higher compared to the control. After 28 days, the relative abundance of P. parvum was approximately 53% higher in 10 μg/l atrazine compared to the control. Glyphosate exhibited no statistically-significant effect on the relative abundance of P. parvum. Inadequate characterization of the microbial community and uncertainty due to ecological and allelopathic effects of P. parvum made it difficult to establish strong relationships between herbicide sensitivity and nutritional mode. Large volumes of mobile and persistent herbicides with high toxicity to phytoplankton are used in cotton defoliation in Texas prior to the typical P. parvum pre-bloom period. These results have important implications for management, such as whether reduction in herbicide runoff could decrease the frequency and duration of P. parvum blooms in the future.

In the original publication of this article, the circles were not shown in Fig. 1. The circled data points show statistically significant differences in the relative abundance of Prymnesium parvum (ANOVA, Tukey's HSD). The correct version of Fig. 1 is provided, where the original graph remains the same and the missing circles have now been included. Fig. 1 Relative abundance of P. parvum in varying concentrations of atrazine over 4 weeks. Error bars denote ±1 SD from the mean. All circled data points indicate statistically-significant differences in abundance (ANOVA, Tukey's HSD)The online version of the original article can be found under