Towards the validation of endogenous steroid testing in wildlife hair

1. Hair is emerging as a popular tool to examine steroid hormone levels in wild mammals. The reliability of this approach, however, depends on an understanding of steroid hormone incorporation into hair as well as appropriate validations.
2. We reviewed studies that have examined steroid hormones in wildlife hair with the goal of summarizing the analytical, physiological, and biological evidence that this approach is meaningful. Accordingly, we differentiated among validations aimed at evaluating the reliability of the analytical method versus those designed to assess whether hormone levels in hair reflect physiologically meaningful processes in the target species.
3. Our literature survey revealed that endogenous steroids have been examined in hair from 42 species of non-human animals across 7 mammalian classes. Although the majority (85%) of 72 studies reported analytical validations of the method, physiological validations have only been reported for five species. Moreover, results...