Cellular responses to neurotoxic compounds of environmental significance

Many neurotoxic chemicals of environmental significance can be conveniently classified according to their cellular site of action in the nervous system. This paper considers neurotoxins which damage the nerve cell body (neuronopathy), its axonal process (axonopathy), or the myelin sheath which segmentally enwraps the myelinated axon (myelinopathy). Each of these three conditions can be reproduced in experimental animals for study of the mechanisms and consequences of neurotoxic damage. Detailed morphological examination of toxic distal axonopathies have stimulated biochemical studies which promise to yield a precise explanation of the molecular basis for this common type of neurotoxic disease. It seems possible that a precise description of the molecular basis for toxic distal axonal degeneration is within sight.