Organ selectivity of chemical carcinogens.

Chemical carcinogens are organ selective and not organ specific. Microsomal degranulation elution profiles employing sepharose CL-2B gel filtration for the separation of microsomes from different organs of rats before and after treatment with some known chemical carcinogens have shown for the first time that carcinogens selectively detach maximum ribosomes from rough reticular membranes of their target organs. The detachment of ribosomes from other organs varies, but is comparatively lesser than that in the target organs. A chemical carcinogen might, therefore, be tumorigenic for several organs, possibly depending on the dose reaching a particular organ and its activation to the ultimate form of the carcinogen.