Mutagenesis In Sub Mammalian Systems

Topics in Toxicology Toxicology is a science that stands at the intersection of several interests and disciplines. These intersecting forces are by no means all scientific since some are legal and some are commercial. All have valid things to say about the conduct and interpretation of toxicity experiments. The practising toxicologist must bear all these sometimes conflicting forces in mind as he carries out his duties. This is especially true, of course, of the toxicologist in industry. Toxicology is also a field in which contract research particularly flourishes and a number of major contract research companies have established over the years a reputation for contributing usefully to the practice of this skill. These contract research organisations are particu larly favoured to develop an appreciation of the problems of the industrial toxicologist, since it is very common for such a company to service the toxicological needs of companies in several sectors of industry producing new chemical compounds, and the contract research company, therefore, is aware of a wider diversity of problems than probably affects a single toxicologist in one industry.

Frederick J. de Serres, Ph. D. Office of the Associate Director for Genetics National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Research Triangle Park, North Carolina (U. S. A. ) 27709 The Workshop on Comparative Chemical Mutagenesis was orga nized to begin the process of problem identification and resolution concerning our needs to evaluate the data on test chemicals arising from assays for mutagenic activity on laboratory organisms. In the past, data on chemical mutagens has been generated and published in the scientific literature on a more or less random basis. Individual chemicals enjoy a brief period of "popularity" that leads to a burst of publications in the same or sometimes related assay systems. The incompleteness of the data base, in many of these cases, makes comparative mutagenesis difficult or impossible. In our attempts to compare the genetic effects of a given chemical over a wide range of assay systems, we are often interested in making quantitative as well as qualitative compari sons. To restate the first comparison: is the chemical under ques tion a weak, moderate or potent mutagen over a wide range of assay systems--or alternatively, does the level of response vary markedly? To make the second comparison, what is needed is information on the spectrum of genetic alterations produced as well as whether this spectrum is consistent over a wide range of organisms.