Detection of genotoxic carcinogens in the in vivo-in vitro hepatocyte DNA repair assay.

The in vivo-in vitro hepatocyte DNA repair assay has been shown to be useful in the evaluation of the carcinogenic potential of chemicals. The purpose of this study was to apply this assay to determining the genotoxicity of the compounds from a wide variety of structural classes. Male Fischer-334 rats were treated by gavage or ip injection with compounds dissolved in either corn oil, water, or dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO). At selected times after treatment, hepatocytes were isolated by liver perfusion and cultured with 3H-thymidine, Unscheduled DNA synthesis (UDS) was measured by quantitative autoradiography as net grains/nucleus (NG); greater than or equal to 5 NG was considered positive. Water, corn oil, or DMSO controls produced -3 to -6 NG with less than or equal to 6% of the cells in repair. All genotoxic hepatocarcinogens tested produced strong positive responses of greater than 15 NG including dimethylnitrosamine, 2-acetylaminofluorene (2-AAF), azoxymethane, 1,2-dimethylhydrazine, benzidine, aflatoxin B1, 2,6-dinitrotoluene, and 2,4-diaminotoluene. The noncarcinogen, 2,6-diaminotoluene, was negative. The mutagen and rat brain carcinogen methyl methanesulfonate (MMS) and the rat pancreatic carcinogen azaserine were also positive. The carcinogens benzo(a)pyrene and 7,12-dimethylbenz(a)anthracene yielded from -2 to -4 NG. This negative response is consistent with their lack of carcinogenic activity in rat liver. MMS produced the greatest amount of UDS 2 hr after treatment whereas 2-AAF did not induce its maximum response until 12 hr post-treatment. The potent hepatotoxin carbon tetrachloride induced a 40-fold elevation in DNA replication 48 hr after a 400 mg/kg dose, but no UDS was observed at 2, 12, 24, or 48 hr post-treatment. The weak hepatocarcinogen safrole induced no UDS suggesting that it is either nongenotoxic or is metabolized to an active form at an extremely slow rate following a single administration. These results demonstrate that this assay is valuable for the detection and study of a variety of genotoxic carcinogens.