New approaches to antimutagenesis.

One of the most worrisome possibilities in the field of antimutagenesis and anticarcinogenesis is that factors that protect against one mutagen or carcinogen will not be effective against another. Indeed, such specificities are known. Consequently, protective agents found in experimental screens and systems may not be relevant to the human situation. Additionally, the question of dose is also problematic, because factors that can protect against the levels of mutagens or carcinogens present in the human environment may be overwhelmed by the large dose of the agent used in the experiment, a dose necessitated by the need to have an effect against which protection can be judged. We suggest here that the new technologies available for the measurement of somatic mutation and chromosomal damage can be used to study spontaneous events, thus avoiding both problems.