Environmental genotoxicity: probing the underlying mechanisms.

Abstract

Environmental pollution is a complex issue because of the diversity of anthropogenic agents, both chemical and physical, that have been detected and catalogued. The consequences to biota from exposure to genotoxic agents present an additional problem because of the potential for these agents to produce adverse change at the cellular and organismal levels. Past studies in genetic toxicology at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory have focused on structural damage to the DNA of environmental species that may occur after exposure to genotoxic agents and the use of this information to document exposure and to monitor remediation. In an effort to predict effects at the population, community, and ecosystem levels, current studies in genetic ecotoxicology are attempting to characterize the biologic mechanisms at the gene level that regulate and limit the response of an individual organism to genotoxic factors in their environment. -Environ Health Perspect 102(Suppl 12):13-17 (1994)

Genetic and Molecular Ecotoxicology: A Research Framework

“…One of the potentially most productive approaches would be to: a) use biomarkers to identify individuals sensitive to exposure (29); b) determine the genotypes of these individuals at critical loci; c) determine the genotypes of tolerant individuals at these same loci; d) determine whether certain alleles at these loci conferred greater fitness and, ideally, why that was the case; and then e) determine the frequencies of genotypes at these loci in exposed and unexposed populations. This might be particularly easy to address at the microbial level.…”

Evaluating wastewater‐induced plant genotoxicity using randomly amplified polymorphic DNA

“…Besides, several studies have revealed that TWW often still contains mutagens (genotoxic substances) that can not only injure the integrity of the genome of organisms but also negatively affect the expression of DNA directly or indirectly (Shugart and Theodorakis, 1994;Filipic and Toman, 1996;Grisolia et al, 2005). This leads to an increase in different types of tumors and subsequently an alteration in the genetic variability of the exposed populations over time (Zhiyi and Haowen, 2004).…”

Genotoxicity Testing in Pesticide Safety Evaluation

“…Emphasis has been given on the effective detection of mutations as it not only provides the basis for biomonitoring, but also serves to identify vulnerable stages in the life history of a species, the nature and dynamics of causal agents and associated phenotypic and population-level effects (Shugart and Theodorakis, 1994). Several genotoxic effects like, DNA adducts, DNA breakage, chromosomal aberrations and sister chromatid exchanges can be observed in organisms exposed to various pollutants (Venier et al, 1997;Das & John, 1999).…”