The price of progress or Pandora's purse

Our plain-English summary of The price of progress or Pandora's purse, by E. Bresnick (Biochemical Pharmacology, 1983).

The study

• Author: E. Bresnick
• Journal: Biochemical Pharmacology
• Published: 1983;32(8):1331-6
• Type of article: Review
• Cited by: 1 article, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

In plain English

This article was a commentary, not a report of one new study. The author reviewed research on how chemical carcinogens, mainly benzo[a]pyrene, are activated in cells, bind to DNA and are repaired, and how the persistence of this DNA damage relates to cancer. One section described experiments from the author's laboratory, cited as in press, on a hamster tracheal epithelial cell line. Benzo[a]pyrene coated onto asbestos fibers was taken up by the cells more rapidly than uncoated benzo[a]pyrene and stayed in the cells longer. Three days after a single dose, considerably higher levels of benzo[a]pyrene were associated with the cells' DNA when it was given coated on asbestos than when it was given alone. This effect was not seen when asbestos was added to the cells 1 hour before benzo[a]pyrene. The commentary did not name the type of asbestos or give numerical results for these experiments. The author concluded that enhanced uptake from coated asbestos markedly influences how fast benzo[a]pyrene disappears from cell DNA and may increase neoplastic (cancerous) transformation. The author said this needs further study.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: commentary (narrative review of chemical carcinogenesis research, including work from the author's own laboratory)
• Who was studied: Asbestos section: a hamster tracheal epithelial cell line studied in the author's laboratory. The rest of the commentary reviews cell, tissue and animal studies by many groups.
• Exposure: Benzo[a]pyrene coated onto asbestos fibers, compared with benzo[a]pyrene alone and with asbestos added 1 hour before benzo[a]pyrene. The asbestos fiber type and the doses are not stated.
• Main results:
  • In the hamster tracheal epithelial cells, benzo[a]pyrene coated onto asbestos was taken up more rapidly than uncoated benzo[a]pyrene.
  • In the same cells, the benzo[a]pyrene stayed inside the epithelial cells for longer periods of time.
  • By 3 days after a single dose, considerably higher levels of benzo[a]pyrene were associated with tracheal cell DNA after the coated asbestos than after benzo[a]pyrene alone. No numbers were given.
  • The effect was not seen when asbestos was added to the cells 1 hour before benzo[a]pyrene.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that the enhanced uptake of benzo[a]pyrene from coated asbestos markedly influences how quickly benzo[a]pyrene disappears from tracheal cell DNA, and that this may increase neoplastic transformation. The author suggested the cocarcinogenic role of asbestos and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons may be caused by enhanced uptake and the resulting apparent persistence of DNA adducts.
• Limitations the authors state:
  • The author stated that the asbestos and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon question still needs to be pursued, and perhaps extended to mixtures of these compounds.
  • The author stated that the mechanism by which cells remove polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon adducts from DNA was unknown.

Related studies

• Increased 8-hydroxyguanine in DNA and its repair activity in hamster and rat lung after intratracheal instillation of crocidolite asbestos — R. Yamaguchi, T. Hirano, et al. (1999)
• Non-enzymatic extramicrosomal bioactivation of chemical carcinogens by phagocytes: a proposed new pathway — A.A. Roman-Franco (1982)
• On the mechanism of cogenotoxic action between ingested amphibole asbestos fibres and benzo[a]pyrene: II. Tissue specificity studies using comet assay — C. Varga, G. Horváth, et al. (1999)
• Implications of multiple mechanisms of carcinogenesis for short-term testing — B.L. Harper, D.L. Morris (1984)
• Participation of nitric oxide and iron in the oxidation of DNA in asbestos-treated human lung epithelial cells — C.C. Chao, S.H. Park, et al. (1996)
• Patterns of 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine formation in DNA and indications of oxidative stress in rat and human pleural mesothelial cells after exposure to crocidolite asbestos — H. Fung, Y.W. Kow, et al. (1997)

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