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Long-term lymphoid cell lines (LCL) derived from normal individuals, patients with ataxia telangiectasia (A-T), xeroderma pigmentosum (XP), and Fanconi anemia (FA) were exposed to various concentrations of 11 chemical clastogens. The agents were chosen to represent a variety of suggested modes of action. In contrast to all other genotypes, the FA lines demonstrated significant rates of spontaneous chromosomal breakage and showed hypersensitivity to all of the clastogens employed. Variability among lines within a genotype suggested individual responses to specific agents. Computation of "corrected values" to address the problem of baseline disparity removed some of the significant differences between the FA and other lines. Nonetheless, following correction, the FA genotype was still delineated by clastogens which are not DNA cross-linkers. The A-T lines were specifically identified by the induction of chromosome damage by bleomycin and neocarzinostatin.

Cytogenetic damage was investigated in long term lymphoid cell lines derived from normal individuals, patients with Fanconi's anemia (FA), ataxia telangiectasia (AT), xeroderma pigmentosum (XP), and FA heterozygotes. The cell lines were exposed to various concentrations of four chemical clastogens, including the alkylating agents diepoxybutane, mitomycin C, and nitrogen mustard, as well as the antitumor glycopeptide bleomycin. The FA cells exhibited chromosomal hypersensitivity to all four clastogens and could be distinguished from the other genotypes. AT cells were identified by bleomycin, while FA heterozygotes could not be reliably detected. Discriminant function analysis was used to describe the cytogenetic response to the various clastogens. This method might prove useful for evaluation and classification of multivariate chromosome breakage studies.