A healthy pregnancy is the basic prerequisite for the healthy development of the growing child. The successful course of a pregnancy depends largely on the mother establishing and maintaining immunological tolerance towards her child. In order to ensure the development of fetal tolerance, the mother's immune cells are regulated by a variety of factors. Various hormones, which increase significantly during pregnancy, play an important role here. After these hormones bind to their receptors on/in the immune cells, they trigger specific signaling pathways that strengthen the proliferation and function of fetus-favoring immune cell populations and inhibit those of fetus-damaging immune cell populations. In this way, they keep the maternal immune system in a delicate balance.

Alarmingly, there is increasing evidence that man-made chemicals used as ingredients in everyday products have "hormone-like" effects. These so-called endocrine disruptors bind to the same receptors as naturally occurring hormones, but trigger different mechanisms in the target cells. A large number of scientific studies have already clearly demonstrated that endocrine disruptors have a long-lasting effect on hormone balance and therefore impair the course of pregnancy and the health of the offspring. As a result, they reduce reproductive success in the population on the one hand and increase the risk of pregnancy-associated secondary diseases in the growing child on the other hand. In addition, there is increasing evidence that environmental chemicals severely limit the success of artificial reproductive technologies.

Our research aims to decipher the mechanisms of action of environmental chemicals with a focus on endocrine disruptors and the immune system in order to ensure reproductive success within our society on the one hand and to protect the health of our children on the other hand. To answer our scientific questions, we use established and validated test systems and develop novel test methods using in vitro and in vivo model systems.