In vitro screening for metabolic interactions among frequently occurring binary mixtures of volatile organic chemicals in Norwegian occupational atmosphere.

Surveys of Norwegian industrial occupational atmosphere between 1983 to 1996, have identified the 12 most frequent occurring binary combinations of volatile organic chemicals. These combinations were tested in vitro for mutual inhibition or enhancement of metabolism by the head space vial equilibration technique with liver S9 obtained from in vivo untreated or pretreated (with the binary mixture) rats. The in vitro system responded to in vivo pretreatment by increasing the metabolic rate of several potentially toxic organic chemicals such as toluene, xylene, styrene, and dichloromethane. In untreated liver S9, the metabolism of several of the tested binary pairs was inhibited when coexposed in vitro to their most prevalent follower as shown for instance for ethanol (with ethyl acetate), dichloromethane (with styrene) and mutually between toluene and xylene. This inhibitory effect disappeared, however, for several of the solvents when combined with the in vivo induced liver S9, a situation which may be the most relevant for occupational exposure. It is concluded that several metabolic interactions occur between low-molecular weight volatile chemicals found in occupational air. These are both inductive and inhibitory in nature and a further mechanistic evaluation including a higher number of differentiated dosage levels, must be performed before a possible health hazard can be confirmed or rejected for the investigated combinations.