Young, Bi And Polar

When they began finding polar bears with both male and female sex organs, scientists had a suspicion about what might be causing the deformities. The industrial chemicals known as PCBs, which have polluted land and water all over the world, tend to become concentrated in animals' fatty tissues. Seals, which are the bears' main source of food, are essentially blobs of blubber with flippers attached. And because PCBs are thought to mimic estrogen, some experts fear that even low-level exposure could wreak havoc with a bear's reproductive system.

At the time, that chain of reasoning was mostly theoretical. Now, the Arctic...

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