Sister chromatid exchange and DNA damage in human lymphocytes induced by air-dust in Lanzhou City: involvement in free radicals

The air-dust samples collected from petro-chemical industrial region in the suburb of Lanzhou and from a certain rural region 64 km away from the city were extracted, with a mixed solvent (benzene: hexane: isopropanol=7:2:1) for 8 hours. A strong free radical signal at g= 2.00 of air-dust itself and a hyperfine splitting EPR signal of extract from air-dust have been detected. The sister chromatid exchange frequency (SCE) was increased by extracts of both dusts from the industrial region and from the rural region. If a chemical is able to increase SCE up to twice as high as the control, this chemical is considered to be mutagenic and/or carcinogenic. The double SCE frequency concentration is 23 μg/ml for the dust extract obtained from the industrial region and 47μg/ml for that from the rural region. Extracts were able to damage to DNA template. Results indicated that the mutagenicity and/or carcinogenicity of the extracts obtained from the petro-chemical industrial region were stronger than that of the

Sister chromatid exchange and DNA damage in human lymphocytes induced by air-dust in Lanzhou City: involvement in free radicals