CHROMOSOME-DAMAGE AND DNA-REPAIR RESPONSE IN LYMPHOCYTES OF WOMEN WHOHAD CHILDREN WITH NEURAL-TUBE DEFECTS

Mothers who resided in Brownsville, Texas and who had children with ne ural tube defects (NTD) were studied to determine whether exposure to environmental mutagens may be a cause of abnormal reproductive outcome s, Peripheral blood lymphocytes from 19 of the mothers who had childre n with NTD and from 14 matched mothers who had normal children and who resided in Corpus Christi, Texas were investigated using the standard cytogenetic assay and a challenge assay to determine the existence of chromosome aberrations and abnormal DNA repair response. No differenc es were observed when the spontaneous and the challenged chromosome ab erration frequencies were compared between the core and the control gr oups. Our data suggests that the core group was not exposed to mutagen s at levels to cause significant increases of chromosome aberrations o r to cause abnormal DNA repair response as determined by our assays. H owever, exposure to non-mutagenic environmental teratogens cannot be r uled out.