A new study has confirmed that bisphenol A leaches from those popular, colored plastic drinking bottles into people’s bodies.

A research team led by Karin Michels of the Harvard School of Public Health asked 77 students to consume beverages from stainless steel bottles for a week to rid themselves of BPA, which is normally cleared through the urine hours after consumption.

The students provided urine samples throughout the washout period and during the second week, when they consumed all liquids from polycarbonate bottles manufactured using BPA.

Week 2 specimens contained 69% more BPA than those from Week 1, and were equivalent to levels routinely observed in the general population. All other dietary habits were unchanged over the course of the study, leaving no doubt the BPA came from the bottles.

The study appears in Environmental Health Perspectives.

BPA makes those reusable plastic bottles more durable. It also prevents corrosion in the cans used for commercial soup and baby formula products.

Animal studies suggest that BPA causes developmental and endocrine problems. Recent human studies have linked urinary BPA concentrations to behavioral problems in children, reproductive problems, immune deficiency and an increased risk of diabetes and heart and liver problems.

Last year, amid growing concerns about its health effects, Canada proscribed the use of BPA in baby bottles.

The FDA says that BPA-laced products are safe, even for infants and children. In reaching that conclusion, it overruled its own advisory board which had chastised the agency for relying on industry-sponsored research in its analysis.

Steven Hentges, an American Chemistry Council official representing manufacturers, actually found the Harvard study results to be heartening.  To him, the study indicates “that even exclusive use of polycarbonate bottles does not lead to unusually high levels of bisphenol A in the urine.”

The global recession has been worse than a cold shower for early-stage companies, and now it has moved up the food chain to venture capital firms and their star players as well. 

The National Venture Capital Association is reporting for example, that the number of active VC firms has dropped from a 2007 high of 1,019 to 882, and that 15% of all venture-capital principals—the guys who decide whether to invest in start-ups—have left the industry since that time.

The exodus has impacted a stunning array of well known firms and partners. Sequoia Capital, the beast of Menlo Park, which has the pelts of Google, eBay, Cisco and other high flyers on its mantlepiece, has said good-bye to Pierre Lamond, Michael Beckwith and Eric Upin, for example.

Venrock’s managing partner Tony Sun has decided to accept a gold watch, as has Shanda Bahles, a stalwart for 20+ years over at El Dorado Ventures.

Boston-based Atlas Venture Partners has let go at least 6 investment partners in 3 years. The recent departures were triggered by the firm’s decision to close a new fund at $280 million, well short of its $400 million fund-raising target.  Atlas also closed offices in Munich and Paris and Munich last year.

Advanced Technology Ventures, Atlas Venture, VantagePoint and the Foundry Group have also shed partners, according to the Wall Street Journal.

“About once a week, a general partner leaves or a venture fund closes,” Jim Watson the managing general partner of CMEA Capital told the Journal.

The cause of the problem has been a freefall in IPOs and acquisitions involving companies in which the VCs have invested. In 2008, VC funds invested $29.7 billion into young companies but generated only $24.9 billion in revenues, according to VentureSource.