Genotoxicidade dos corantes artificiais amarelo tartazina e vermelho 40, pelo teste SMART de asa, em Drosophila melanogaster

Abstract

Food additives are used by the food industry in order to enhance the aroma, flavor and texture of foods. Of all the additives used colors are the most genotoxic. The azo dyes, derived from oil, used by industries, are the tartrazine and red #40. The SMART wing test was used to verify the possible genotoxic effects of colors in somatic cells of Drosophila melanogaster. For this evaluation were used larvae of 48 hours, descendants of the Standard Cross (ST) and High Bioactivation (HB) that who were treated with tartrazine in concentrations 1.5, 2.5 and 3.0 mg / mL and 5, 10 and 20 mg / mL for the red #40. The results showed significant increase of spots in the ST descendants for tartrazine and HB for the red #40. We concluded that the artificial colors tartrazine and red #40 are genotoxic in the doses used for the study.