Fluoranthene is a ubiquitous environmental pollutant. Although fluoran
thene is mutagenic in bacterial and mammalian in vitro cell systems fo
llowing metabolic activation by rat liver fraction, information on in
vivo mutagenicity is lacking and studies on tumour initiating activity
in mice are equivocal. In the present study, the potential genetic ha
zard to man was assessed using the mouse bone marrow micronucleus and
rat liver unscheduled DNA synthesis test systems. Fluoranthene did not
show any evidence of genotoxicity in either of the in vivo assays fol
lowing acute oral administration at levels of up to 2000 mg/kg b.w.