Mouse-Skin Painting With Smoke Condensates From Cigarettes Made of Pipe, Cigar, and Cigarette Tobaccos2

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Abstract
Groups of CAF 1 mice of both sexes were subjected to skin painting throughout their lifetime with acetone, benzo[a]pyrene, and smoke condensates. To make the condensates, tobaccos customarily used for manufacture of cigars, pipe mixtures, and cigarettes were smoked in the form of cigarettes. Combustion temperatures were practically the same for all types of tobaccos. The LD50 of these condensates was lower for males than females, and lower for pipe smoke condensate than for the other two. Papillomas were recorded when they appeared and all skins were studied histologically after the animals' deaths. Complete autopsies, organ weight measurements, and histologic study of organs were done on all condensate-painted animals (except those with advanced postmortem changes) and on half of the controls. Except for the greater toxicity of the pipe smoke condensate manifested by greater weight loss and mortality, there were no differences in the systemic effects of the condensates. No difference in organ weights ascribable to the treatment was found, nor were any pathologic changes observed in vital organs except some papillary nephritis and skin lesions. All condensates caused skin papillomas and up to 23 percent epidermoid cancers, with slightly more cancers in females than in males. The rate of formation of these lesions was slower with cigarette smoke condensate than with the two other condensates. The acetone controls showed no pathologic changes and only a low incidence of epidermal hyperplasia at the site of painting.