Inhalation of formaldehyde does not induce systemic genotoxic effects in rats

Male Fischer-344 rats were exposed to formaldehyde (FA) by inhalation for 4 weeks (6 h/day, 5 days/week). Groups of six rats each were exposed to the target concentrations of 0, 0.5, 1, 2, 6, 10 and 15 ppm. Potential systemic genotoxic effects were investigated as part of a comprehensive study on local and systemic toxic and genotoxic effects. For this purpose, peripheral blood samples were obtained by puncturing the retro-orbital venous plexus at the end of the exposure period. Blood sampling was carried out in a randomized sequence and samples were coded by sequence number to ensure blind evaluation. Blood samples were used for the comet assay, the sister chromatid exchange test (SCE test) and the micronucleus test (MNT). DNA migration in the comet assay was measured both directly and after irradiation of the blood samples with 2 Gy gamma-radiation. The latter modification of the comet assay was included to increase its sensitivity for the detection of DNA–protein cross-links (DPX). The following positive control groups were included: one group (six animals) was treated with 50 mg/kg methyl methanesulfonate (MMS) once by gavage 4 h before blood sampling. Another group (six animals) was treated twice orally with 10 mg/kg cyclophosphamide (CP) with an interval of 24 h. The last application of CP was 24 h before blood sampling. For the comet assay, four slides were analysed from each blood sample, two without and two with irradiation. From each slide, 50 randomly selected cells were measured by image analysis, and tail intensity (% tail DNA) and tail moment were evaluated. For the SCE test, blood was cultured for 56 h in the presence of BrdU (10 μg/ml for the last 35 h) and SCE were counted in 30 second-division metaphases per sample. The MNT with peripheral blood was performed according to the instructions for the micronucleus analysis kit MICROFLOW (Litron Laboratories). Approximately 20,000 cells per sample were analysed by flow cytometry and the percentage of reticulocytes with micronuclei (MN) was determined. The positive control substances induced a significant effect in the genotoxicity tests and thus demonstrated the sensitivity of the test systems. FA did not induce any significant effect in any of the genotoxicity tests performed. It can be concluded that inhalation of FA in a 28-day study with FA concentrations up to 15 ppm does not lead to systemic genotoxic effects in the blood of rats.