Complexation of 1,2,4-benzenetriol with inorganic and ferritin-released iron in vitro.

The reactive metabolite(s) responsible for the expression of benzene toxicity is not clearly known despite extensive information on the metabolism and hematotoxicity of benzene. It is now widely believed that hematotoxicity of benzene is due to the concerted action of several metabolites which arise from multiple pathways of benzene. In our earlier study, we proposed iron polyphenol chelates as possible toxic metabolites of benzene due to their prooxidant activity. In continuation, we demonstrate the formation of an iron and 1,2,4-benzenetriol (BT) complex, when added together in an acetate buffer, 0.1 M, pH 5.6, by sephadex G-10 column chromatography. It was also observed that iron released from ferritin in the presence of BT formed a complex with BT.