Genotoxicity and Cytotoxicity Evaluation Applied to Environmental Health, Research of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

Environmental toxicology contributes for the evaluation of chemical exposures, proposing interventions based in preventive actions promoting a risk decrease. The industrial development, agriculture activities, the increase of the number of automobiles, among others, lead to a constant increase in the concentrations of air pollutants that are hazardous to health, therefore becoming a public health problem. Besides many chronic and acute respiratory diseases, related to environmental chemical exposures, the consequences related to genotoxic effects are poorly evidenced. Biomarkers of genotoxicity such as the comet assay, micronucleus assay, Salmonella/microsome assay and chromosomal aberration assay are reliable techniques for the early detection of the damage and for the evaluation of the chemical exposure aiming the prevention, mainly in environmental exposures, in which there is a really short window between the exposure to the chemical and the appearance of the damage. This paper aims to identify potential biomarkers of genotoxicity as reference to environmental chemical exposure, its usage and contributions to the decrease of this public health problem, especially for the Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs). Keywords: biomarkers of genotoxicity; environmental health; PAHs;