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Abstract1. A brief introduction to the concept of alkylation is given, which discusses reaction mechanisms and reactivity, and includes an assessment of the susceptibility to alkylation of biologically-important molecules.2. A semi-quantitative colour test for alkylating agents, with 4-(p-nitrobenzyl) pyridine (NBP), has been modified to give a quantitative method for the determination of second-order rate constants, k2, for reaction at 37.5. These constants have been determined for dichlorvos, several other organophosphorus insecticides, and, for comparison, some known biological alkylating agents.3. These results are discussed in relation to the extensive literature data pertaining to the chemical and biological reactivity of these compounds, and an assessment of the biological importance of the alkylating properties of dichlorvos and related organophosphorus insecticides has been made.4. Since dichlorvos is rapidly metabolized in mammals by esterases present at high activity in the liver and moderate activity in lung, spleen, kidney and blood plasma, the chances of its manifesting spontaneous deleterious biological alkylating activity are very low, and may even be zero. Structure/activity correlations suggest that this will also apply to other organophosphate insecticides, but not necessarily to simple alkyl phosphates such as trimethyl phosphate.
Bedford et al. (Sat,) studied this question.