Teratogenicity of adenine in the rat embryo.

It was reported that adenine causes fetal malformations with high frequency when 250 or 300 mkikg of the compound was injected I. p. (.intraperitoneally) to pregnant mice during major organogenesis (Fujii and Nishimura, 1970 Fujii, 1970). Chaube and Murphy (1969) administered the compound i. R. to female rats on day 12 of gestation at various dosages less than 250 mg/kg, but did not find .any embryotoxic effect. In the present experiment, we injected -adenine at higher dosages to rats on various days of gestation to 'examine its potential teratogenicity and the spectrum of malformations.