"The other point in these citations so far is that as far as I understand it, is that the toxicity of those metabolites that are "more toxic" than the parent compound does not exceed that of the original dose of the parent compound--please correct me if I have it wrong."

All these references say that there are fewer metabolites than the amount of the original dose of the parent compound (IMI). What you are missing is that the metabolites have the same effect as the parent compound at much lower doses, that is what is meant by "more toxic". They also persist at sublethal levels for quite some time, longer than the IMI. Thus, they are worrisome.


See figures 2 and 3. And please notice the scale on the Y axis in 2 compared to 3. Those compounds take a while to clear! That's because (I bet) the stubborn residues are in places like synapses, where they are slow to diffuse back out. The so-called "sinks".


Christina

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