Salāmat-i kār-i Īrān (Apr 2007)
Toxicity assessment of chemical contaminants;transition from in vitromethods to novel in vitro methods
Abstract
Exposure to occupational and environmental contaminants is a major contributor to human health problems. Despite significant achievements in the risk assessment of chemicals, the toxicological database, particularly for industrial chemicals, remains limited. Considering there areapproximately 80, 000 chemicals in commerce, and an extremely large number of chemical mixtures, in vivo testing of this large number is unachievable from ethical, economical and scientific perspectives. Therefore, increasing the number of available industrial chemicals andnew products has created a demand for alternatives to animal methods for better safety evaluation. Recent toxicity studies have demonstrated that in vitro methods are capable of rapidly providing toxicity information. In this review, current toxicity test methods for risk evaluation of industrial chemical contaminants are presented. To evaluate the potential applications of more recent test methods developed for toxicity testing of chemical contaminants are discussed. Although to be considered more broadly for risk assessment of human chemical exposures. In vitro methods,in vitro toxicology methods cannot exactly mimic the biodynamics of the whole body, in vitro relationships (QSARs) and physiologically based toxicokinetic (PBTK) models have a potentialtest systems in combination with the knowledge of quantitative structure activity.
