Guillén M D, Sopelana P, Partearroyo M A
Faculty of Pharmacy, Basque Country University, Vitoria, Spain.
Rev Environ Health. 1997 Jul-Sep;12(3):133-46. doi: 10.1515/reveh.1997.12.3.133.
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) belong to a large chemical family comprising many different compounds with important biological activity in mutagenic and carcinogenic processes. PAH have been detected in both raw and processed foods. The presence of PAH in non-processed foods is associated with environmental pollution from both human and industrial activities, whereas contamination of processed foods can be caused by certain preservation and processing procedures. Both toxicological and epidemiological studies have shown a relation between such compounds and tumor development. The data indicate that PAH must undergo a biotransformation process that causes the formation of biologically active metabolites. In this process, the presence of an enzyme complex that is induced by different xenobiotics is implied, making the toxicity of such compounds hard to predict. As setting a threshold limit below which toxicity could be considered negligible is difficult, the presence of PAH in foodstuffs should be reduced to as low as possible by controlling environmental contamination and all procedures that could cause PAH contamination during food processing, preserving, and packaging.
多环芳烃（PAH）属于一个庞大的化学家族，包含许多不同的化合物，它们在诱变和致癌过程中具有重要的生物活性。在生食和加工食品中均检测到了PAH。未加工食品中PAH的存在与人类和工业活动造成的环境污染有关，而加工食品的污染可能是由某些保存和加工过程导致的。毒理学和流行病学研究均表明，此类化合物与肿瘤发展之间存在关联。数据表明，PAH必须经历生物转化过程，该过程会导致形成具有生物活性的代谢产物。在此过程中，意味着存在由不同外源性物质诱导的酶复合物，这使得此类化合物的毒性难以预测。由于难以设定一个毒性可被视为可忽略不计的阈值，因此应通过控制环境污染以及食品加工、保存和包装过程中所有可能导致PAH污染的程序，将食品中PAH的含量降至尽可能低的水平。
