Abstract: Birth defects are important factors affecting the quality of the population and destroying the happiness of the family. Environmental risk factors can lead to many kinds of serious birth defects. With the development of detection techniques，the exposure levels of environmental pollutants can be detected more and more accurately. We also get better understanding of the molecular mechanism of environmental pollutants caused birth defects. This paper reviews the environmental risk factors leading to birth defects and where they come from. The technologies detecting some kinds of common environmental teratogens exposure levels，animal models and methods studying changes of biological function were also included.

Key words: Congenital abnormalities, Environment, Exposure in vivo, Technology