Chemical Carcinogenesis

The paper collates a series of data arrived at by different authors in the study of molecular and cellular phenomena which are observed in chemical carcinogenesis and during the formation and turnover of macromolecules of normal cell plasma membrane at different phases of the cell cycle. The principal peculiarities of chemical carcinogenesis are: (1) hereditary nature of cell transformation; (2) absence of full correlation between mutagenic and carcinogenic activity; (3) the obligatory formation of a covalent bond between the chemical carcinogen and the macromolecule target; (4) the carcinogen’s ability to bond with H protein(s); (5) the absence of H protein(s) in transformed cells; (6) the induction of passivity of the overwhelming mass of cells of organs and tissues sensitive to the chemical carcinogen and subject to it, and the reversibility of this passivity in the case of all affected cells, except transformed ones; (7) the different immunological specificity of new transplantation antigens induced in cells of a single clone by one and the same carcinogen. The idea is advanced that these principal peculiarities can be understood from a single position if it is assumed that the