Carcinogenicity of the Methyl-1,2-Benzanthracenes and their Derivatives

Abstract

A NUMBER of theories have recently been put forward to account for the carcinogenic activity of the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons; in their present form, the majority of these theories do not provide a rationale for the fact that a number of chemically dissimilar carcinogens appear to operate through some common protein deletion principle¹. Previous descriptions of a possible mechanism of carcinogenesis^2–4 have pointed out, however, that, in principle at least, the unifying mechanism by which such carcinogens act may be their formation of charge-transfer complexes with proteins; we are now able to discuss the activities of the methyl-1,2-benzanthracenes and the mono-fluoro-10-methyl-1,2-benzanthracenes (Fig. 1) in such terms.