Chromosome painting for cytogenetic monitoring of occupationally exposed and non-exposed groups of human individuals

The suitability of a three-color fluorescence in situ suppression hybridiza tion technique was examined for monitoring five different groups of individ uals: 30 occupied in radiology, 26 occupied in nuclear medicine or radiatio n physics, 32 patients with breast cancer, 26 occupied with military waste disposal, all presumably exposed to low doses of radiation or chemical muta gens and a non-exposed control group (N = 29). The average frequency of bre aks constituting the various aberrations did not significantly differ betwe en the groups of medical radiation appliers and the control group. However, breast tumor patients and military waste disposers, as groups, showed a hi gher aberration rate than did healthy controls. Stable rearrangements mainl y characterized the groups of controls, tumor patients, and radiation appli ers, while a higher proportion of unstable aberrations was found in the che mically exposed individuals. Individuals with an increased frequency of abe rrations could be detected within each examined group, which clearly determ ined the average values of the whole group. With respect to interchromosoma l distribution of the breakpoints constituting the found aberrations and th e involvement of the labeled chromosomes in rearrangements, the observed va lues were very close to the expected ones in the controls. A rather similar trend of deviations from expectation was observed in all other groups. Chr omosome 4 was slightly over-affected, while chromosome 2 was slightly under represented in all analyzed groups (except tumor patients). Rearrangements of the labeled chromosomes with the unlabeled ones exceeded expectation. In conclusion, chromosome painting if included in further attempts of human p opulation monitoring will broaden the basis of argumentation with respect t o health risks introduced by mutagen exposure. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B. V. All rights reserved.