Morphological transformation of C3H/10T1/2 CL8 cells by procarcinogens

In order to increase the sensitivity of the C3H/10T1/2 CL8 (10T1/2) cell transformation system, we increased the chemical exposure period to a total of 6 days (two consecutive 3-day exposures). Using this modified procedure, we transformed 10T1/2 cells with procarcinogens such as aflatoxin B1, benz(a)anthracene, and 4-nitroquinoline-1-oxide which have been negative in the standard 10T1/2 cell transformation assay. However, beta-naphthylamine was inconclusive and 2-acetylamino-fluorine was negative in this modified assay system. Our results demonstrate that a simple modification of the 10T1/2 cell transformation method can increase the sensitivity to some procarcinogens that require metabolic activation.