An early developmental vertebrate model for nanomaterial safety: Bridging cell-based and mammalian toxicity assessment

Carl A. Webster, Desire Di Silvio, Aarthi Devarajan, Paolo Bigini, Edoardo Micotti, Chiara Giudice, Mario Salmona, Grant N. Wheeler, Victoria Sherwood (Lead / Corresponding author), Francesca Baldelli Bombelli (Lead / Corresponding author)

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    21 Citations (Scopus)
    244 Downloads (Pure)

    Abstract

    Aim: With the rise in production of nanoparticles (NPs) for an ever-increasing number of applications, there is an urgent need to efficiently assess their potential toxicity. We propose a NP hazard assessment protocol that combines mammalian cytotoxicity data with embryonic vertebrate abnormality scoring to determine an overall toxicity index. Results: We observed that, after exposure to a range of NPs, Xenopus phenotypic scoring showed a strong correlation with cell based in vitro assays. Magnetite-cored NPs, negative for toxicity in vitro and Xenopus, were further confirmed as nontoxic in mice. Conclusion: The results highlight the potential of Xenopus embryo analysis as a fast screening approach for toxicity assessment of NPs, which could be introduced for the routine testing of nanomaterials.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)643-656
    Number of pages14
    JournalNanomedicine
    Volume11
    Issue number6
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - Mar 2016

    Keywords

    • cytotoxicity
    • in vitro-in vivo correlations
    • nanomaterials
    • nanomedicine
    • nanotoxicity
    • Xenopus laevis

    ASJC Scopus subject areas

    • General Materials Science
    • Bioengineering
    • Biomedical Engineering
    • Medicine (miscellaneous)
    • Development

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