Liver cultures carcinogen metabolism

J. McCann and B. N. Ames, Detection of carcinogens as mutagens in the Salmonella/ microsome test Assay of 300 chemicals, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 72, 5135-5139 (1975). I. Schmeltz, J. Tosk, and G. M. Williams, Comparison of the metabolic profiles of benzo(a)pyrene obtained from primary cell cultures and subcellular fractions derived from normal and methylcholanthrene-induced rat liver. Cancer Lett. 5, 81-89, (1978). 

Cultured mammalian cell systems offer advantages for studying carcinogenesis at the cellular level in the absence of humoral factors that operate in vivo. However, other factors important in animals, such as dose and route of administration, metabolic activation, detoxification by the liver, or transport of organotropic carcinogens to appropriate target sites, must also be considered when in vitro systems are used as predictors of carcinogenicity. 

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