Results of micronucleus assays with individuals who are occupationally and environmentally exposed to mercury, lead and cadmium

Publication date: Available online 6 April 2016 Source:Mutation Research/Reviews in Mutation Research Author(s): Armen Nersesyan, Michael Kundi, Monika Waldherr, Tahereh Setayesh, Miroslav Mišík, Georg Wultsch, Metka Filipic, Gustavo Barcelos, Siegfried Knasmueller Millions of humans are exposed occupationally or environmentally to lead and mercury compounds. Mercury compounds are less abundant but some of them belong to the most toxic chemicals which are known. We evaluated the literature to find out if these compounds act in humans as genotoxic carcinogens and if their health effects can be predicted by use of micronucleus (MN) assays with lymphocytes and/or with other genotoxicity tests. Numerous studies showed that lead and mercury compounds induce cancer in humans and also in animals, in vitro experiments with cultured cells indicate that they cause DNA damage via different molecular mechanisms including release of reactive oxygen species and interactions with DNA repair processes. Also in most human studies, positive results were obtained in MN tests with lymphocytes (all 15 occupational studies with lead yielded positive results, with mercury 6 out of 7 investigations were positive). For cadmium, there is clear evidence that it causes cancer in humans; however, induction of chromosomal damage was only seen in high dose experiments with mammalian cells while results of animal and human studies yielded conflicting results (only in 2 of 5MN trials ...
Source: Mutation Research Reviews in Mutation Research - Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Source Type: research