Mutagenic and cytotoxic effectiveness of zinc dimethyl and zinc diisononyldithiocarbamate in human lymphocyte cultures.

The mutagenic and cytotoxic effectiveness of the vulcanisation accelerators zinc dimethyldithiocarbamate (ZDMC; ziram) and zinc diisononyldithiocarbamate (ZDINDC; arbestab Z) was tested in lymphocyte cultures of five healthy probands. ZDMC and ZDINDC (c=0.1, 1.0 and 10.0microg/ml) were studied in lymphocyte cultures without external metabolic activation. Additionally, incubation of the compounds (c=10.0microg/ml) was performed in the presence of liver microsomes from aroclor-induced rats (1 and 2h, 1 and 2mg microsomal protein). Genotoxicity testing was performed by analysis of chromosomal aberrations (CA), sister chromatid exchanges (SCEs) and micronuclei (MN). For evaluation of antiproliferative effects, mitotic index (MI) and cell cycle kinetics (CCK) were determined. In contrast to earlier investigations we found no significantly increased mutagenic or cytotoxic activity of ZDMC; ZDINDC also was inactive under these conditions.