The carcinogenic potential of aflatoxin or its metabolites in rats from dams fed aflatoxin pre- and postpartum
Grice, H.C.; Moodie, C.A.; Smith, D.C.
Cancer Research 33(2): 262-268
1973
ISSN/ISBN: 0008-5472 PMID: 4347465 Document Number: 70047
A diet with groundnut meal 25 or 50% which contained aflatoxin B1 100 and aflatoxin B2 0.2 mg/kg but no aflatoxin G1 or G2 was given to 60 Wistar rats from day 10 of pregnancy to parturition, from day 1 to 10 after parturition or from day 10 of pregnancy to day 10 after parturition. When the groundnut meal was not included in the diet soya bean meal was used as a substitute. There were benign and malignant tumours in all groups including the dams. The liver was the only organ that frequently developed tumours and tumour-like lesions in treated dams and offspring but not in controls. The first liver lesion seen in a dam was a biliary cyst. Malignant tumours were not found in dams. The first liver lesion in the young was a biliary cyst and the first malignant tumour was a cholangiocarcinoma. Other conditions found in dams and young were bile duct proliferation, biliary, hepatic and angiomatous cystic lesions and nodular hyperplasia of the liver. Conditions found in the young alone were cholangiocarcinoma and hepatocellular carcinoma. Pregnant rats were fed a diet of which 25% or 50% was groundnut meal containing aflatoxin. Benign and malignant tumours were found in most tissues or organs, except bone and striated muscle, in dams and male and female progeny, irrespective of whether the contaminated meal was fed before or after parturition. The effects were not dose-related. The progeny developed inflammatory, hyperplastic and neoplastic changes in the livers, and malignant liver neoplasms were seen in the progeny, but not in the dams.