A comparative study on the mutagenicity of ethylenethiourea in bacterial and mammalian test systems

Abstract

The mutagenic effect of ethylenethiourea (ETU), a degradation product and metabolite of ethylenebisdithiocarbamates, which are widely used as fungicides, was studied in different test systems. ETU induced mutations of the base-pair substitution type in Salmonella typhimurium TA 1530 in vitro as well as in the host-mediated assay. In the host-mediated assay, a dose of 6000 mg/kg (LD 50 = 5400 mg/kg) resulted in a slight but significant increase of the reversion frequency by a factor of 2.37. The results of the micronucleus test were negative after two-fold oral applications of 700, 1850 and 6000 mg/kg to Swiss albino mice. Thus it is concluded that ETU hardly induces any chromosomal anomality in the bone marrow. No dominant-lethal effect was observed after single oral doses of 500, 1000 and 3500 mg/kg given to male mice.