Chemicals which cause birth defects--teratogens: a special concern of research chemists

Women who are research chemists suffer an unusually high risk of being exposed to teratogenic chemicals (chemicals which cause birth defects) for the principal reason that they spend a good share of their lives in the laboratory in contact with wide variety of chemicals including new chemicals which may be unsuspected teratogens. Women research chemists therefore need to be able (a) to recognize known teratogens and (b) to predict teratogenicity of a compound that has not been tested. This article discusses these two points with an emphasis on the following topics: how to obtain information on teratogenicity of chemicals; how to interpret teratogenicity data from the literature; and how to make an educated guess about the teratogenicity of chemical compounds.