Role of tissue repair in toxicologic interactions among hepatotoxic organics

It is widely recognized that exposure to combinations or mixtures of chemicals may result in highly exaggerated toxicity even though individual chemicals might not be toxic at low doses. Chemical mixtures may also cause additive or less than additive toxicity. From the perspective of public health, highly exaggerated toxicity is of significant concern. Assessment of risk from exposure to chemical mixtures requires knowledge of the underlying mechanisms. Previous studies from this laboratory have shown that nontoxic doses of chlordecone (10 ppm, 15 days) and carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) (100 microliters/kg) interact at the biologic interface, resulting in potentiated liver injury and 67-fold amplification of CCl4 lethality. In contrast, although interaction between phenobarbital and CCl4 leads to even higher injury, animal survival is unaffected because of highly stimulated compensatory tissue repair. A wide variety of additional experimental evidence confirms the central role of stimulated tissue repair as a decisive determinant of the final outcome of liver injury inflicted by hepatotoxicants. These findings led us to propose a two-stage model of toxicity. In this model, tissue injury is inflicted in stage one by the well-described mechanisms of toxicity, whereas in stage two the ultimate toxic outcome is determined by whether timely and sufficient tissue repair response accompanies this injury. In an attempt to validate this model, dose-response relationships for injury and tissue repair as opposing responses have been developed for model hepatotoxicants. Results of these studies suggest that tissue repair increases in a dose-dependent manner, restraining injury up to a threshold dose, whereupon it is inhibited, allowing an unrestrained progression of injury. These findings indicate that tissue repair is a quantifiable response to toxic injury and that inclusion of this response in risk assessment may help in fine-tuning prediction of toxicity outcomes.