Assessment of the mutagenicity of the technical product
 of N-(1-ethylpropyl)-2,6-dinitro -3,4-xylidinen

Abstract

Introduction. Evaluation of genotoxicity of the pesticide technical products is one of the mandatory requirements for their toxicological and hygienic assessment. The data about mutagenic property is ambiguous for some pesticides. This may be due to the use of various active ingredients of technical products of the pesticide for testing, as they may have different profiles of relevant impurities, some of which may be potentially genotoxic. Material and methods. A technical product of N-(1-ethylpropyl)-2,6-dinitro-3,4-xylidine was tested using the bacterial reverse mutation method with Salmonella typhimurium (Ames test) and the in vivo mammalian micronucleus analysis in mouse bone marrow erythrocytes. Results. Statistically significant dose-dependent mutagenic effects of the technical product of N-(1-ethylpropyl)-2,6-dinitro-3,4-xylidine were revealed for TA97 (+S9 / -S9); TA100 (+S9 / -S9); TA102 (+S9 / -S9) and TA98 (+S9 / -S9) strains. In all cases, the fold increase of the revertant numbers mediated by the tested substance compared with the concurrent negative control was > 2 except TA98 in the presence of S9. In the micronucleus test, the technical product did not induce a statistically significant increase in the frequency of the micronucleated polychromatophilic erythrocytes in CD-1 mouse bone marrow up to 2000 mg/kg bw. Conclusion. The data suggest all technical products of pesticides entering the market should be tested for the potential genotoxicity. In such a case it is necessary to use at least two methods on different test systems for obtaining reliable results.