A new approach to evaluate mechanistic relationships among genotoxic phenomena: validation

In order to determine its applicability for the study of genotoxicity, a recently developed method to probe for possible mechanistic relationships among toxicological phenomena was applied to the induction of mutations in Salmonella typhimurium. Since the basis of this phenomenon is understood, this would provide a test of the applicability of the new method to DNA-based mechanisms. The results presented indicate that significant relationships are indeed found among phenomena involving damage to or modification of DNA but not between them and non-genotoxic phenomena. The present results suggest that the newly developed approach could be applied to test mechanistic hypotheses involving genotoxic phenomena.