| Environmental toxicology deals with complex inter-actions between thousands of environmental chemicals and a multitude of potential adverse effects. Biomarkers are increasingly being used in environmental monitoring to provide evidence that organisms have been exposed to, or affected by, xenobiotic chemicals. Usually, these biomarkers rely on biochemical, histological, morphological, and physiological changes in whole organisms. With many other research-based disciplines, environmental toxicology has profoundly benefited. As a result of these accomplishments, experimental studies of biomarkers have developed into a multidisciplinary research area.. Biomarkers can range from the very simple ones, such as a blood hemoglobin measurement, to very complex and expensive determinations, e.g., of DNA adducts. In applying biomarkers in environmental health and preventive medicine, ethical issues must be addressed. New biomarkers are urgently needed as an integral tool in preventive medicine and environmental health. In the present paper, we briefly discuss the application of biomarkers in ecotoxicology and ecological risk assessment, and we provide examples of how they have been applied.
Keywords: biomarkers, environmental toxicology, environmental health.
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