High-throughput screening is a strategy to identify potential adverse outcome pathways (AOP) for thousands of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) if the specific effects can be distinguished ...from nonspecific effects. We hypothesize that baseline toxicity may serve as a reference to determine the specificity of the cell responses. Baseline toxicity is the minimum (cyto)toxicity caused by the accumulation of chemicals in cell membranes, which disturbs their structure and function. A mass balance model linking the critical membrane concentration for baseline toxicity to nominal (i.e., dosed) concentrations of PFAS in cell-based bioassays yielded separate baseline toxicity prediction models for anionic and neutral PFAS, which were based on liposome-water distribution ratios as the sole model descriptors. The specificity of cell responses to 30 PFAS on six target effects (activation of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR) gamma, aryl hydrocarbon receptor, oxidative stress response, and neurotoxicity in own experiments, and literature data for activation of several PPARs and the estrogen receptor) were assessed by comparing effective concentrations to predicted baseline toxic concentrations. HFPO–DA, HFPO–DA-AS, and PFMOAA showed high specificity on PPARs, which provides information on key events in AOPs relevant to PFAS. However, PFAS were of low specificity in the other experimentally evaluated assays and others from the literature. Even if PFAS are not highly specific for certain defined targets but disturb many toxicity pathways with low potency, such effects are toxicologically relevant, especially for hydrophobic PFAS and because PFAS are highly persistent and cause chronic effects. This implicates a heightened need for the risk assessment of PFAS mixtures because nonspecific effects behave concentration-additive in mixtures.
In this work we combine partition coefficients between water and membrane lipid, storage lipid, the plasma protein albumin as well as structural protein with the tissue dependent fraction of the ...respective phases in order to obtain a clearer picture on the relevance of various biological tissues for the bioaccumulation of 31 organic anions. Most of the partition coefficients are based on experimental data, supplemented by some predicted ones. The data suggest that the plasma protein, albumin, will be the major sorption matrix in mammals. Only small fractions of the studied chemicals will occur freely dissolved in an organism. For the investigated acids with pKa <5, partitioning is dominated by the ionic species rather than the corresponding neutral species. Bioconcentration in fish is not expected to occur for many of these acids unless pH in the aqueous environment is low or specific sorption mechanisms are relevant. In contrast, biomagnification in terrestrial mammals would be expected for most organic anions if they are not sufficiently metabolized. We conclude that sorption is important for the toxicokinetics of ionizable organic chemicals and the dominating sorbing matrices are quite different from those for neutral species.
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•Albumin is expected to be the major sorbing compartment for organic anions in mammals.•The total bioaccumulation potential of organic acids with pKa <5 is dominated by their ionic species•Bioaccumulation of ionizable organic chemicals might be more important for terrestrial than for aquatic organisms
The aim of the current study was to understand and develop models to predict the pH-dependent toxicity of ionizable pharmaceuticals in embryos of the zebrafish Danio rerio. We found a higher uptake ...and toxicity with increasing neutral fraction of acids (diclofenac, genistein, naproxen, torasemide, and warfarin) and bases (metoprolol and propranolol). Simple mass balance models accounting for the partitioning to lipids and proteins in the zebrafish embryo were found to be suitable to predict the bioconcentration after 96 h of exposure if pH values did not differ much from the internal pH of 7.55. For other pH values, a kinetic ion-trap model for the zebrafish embryo explained the pH dependence of biouptake and toxicity. The total internal lethal concentrations killing 50% of the zebrafish embryos (ILC50) were calculated from the measured BCF and LC50. The resulting ILC50 were independent of external pH. Critical membrane concentrations were deduced by an internal mass balance model, and apart from diclofenac, whose specific toxicity in fish had already been established, all pharmaceuticals were confirmed to act as baseline toxicants in zebrafish.
Abiotic stability of chemicals is not routinely tested prior to performing in vitro bioassays, although abiotic degradation can reduce the concentration of test chemicals leading to the formation of ...active or inactive transformation products, which may lead to misinterpretation of bioassay results. A high-throughput workflow was developed to measure the abiotic stability of 22 test chemicals in protein-rich aqueous media under typical bioassay conditions at 37 °C for 48 h. These test chemicals were degradable in the environment according to a literature review. The chemicals were extracted from the exposure media at different time points using a novel 96-pin solid-phase microextraction. The conditions were varied to differentiate between various reaction mechanisms. For most hydrolyzable chemicals, pH-dependent degradation in phosphate-buffered saline indicated that acid-catalyzed hydrolysis was less important than reactions with hydroxide ions. Reactions with proteins were mainly responsible for the depletion of the test chemicals in the media, which was simulated by bovine serum albumin (BSA) and glutathione (GSH). 1,2-Benzisothiazol-3(2H)-one, 2-methyl-4-isothiazolinone, and l-sulforaphane reacted almost instantaneously with GSH but not with BSA, indicating that GSH is a good proxy for reactivity with electrophilic amino acids but may overestimate the actual reaction with three-dimensional proteins. Chemicals such as hydroquinones or polyunsaturated chemicals are prone to autoxidation, but this reaction is difficult to differentiate from hydrolysis and could not be simulated by the oxidant N-bromosuccinimide. Photodegradation played a minor role because cells are exposed in incubators in the dark and simulations with high light intensities did not yield realistic degradation. Stability predictions from various in silico prediction models for environmental conditions can give initial indications of the stability but were not always consistent with the experimental stability in bioassays. As the presented workflow can be performed in high throughput under realistic bioassay conditions, it can be used to provide an experimental database for developing bioassay-specific stability prediction models.
The Microtox assay, a bioluminescence inhibition assay with the marine bacterium Aliivibrio fischeri, is one of the most popular bioassays for assessing the cytotoxicity of organic chemicals, ...mixtures and environmental samples. Most environmental chemicals act as baseline toxicants in this short-term screening assay, which is typically run with only 30 min of exposure duration. Numerous Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationships (QSARs) exist for the Microtox assay for nonpolar and polar narcosis. However, typical water pollutants, which have highly diverse structures covering a wide range of hydrophobicity and speciation from neutral to anionic and cationic, are often outside the applicability domain of these QSARs. To include all types of environmentally relevant organic pollutants we developed a general baseline toxicity QSAR using liposome-water distribution ratios as descriptors. Previous limitations in availability of experimental liposome-water partition constants were overcome by reliable prediction models based on polyparameter linear free energy relationships for neutral chemicals and the COSMOmic model for charged chemicals. With this QSAR and targeted mixture experiments we could demonstrate that ionisable chemicals fall in the applicability domain. Most investigated water pollutants acted as baseline toxicants in this bioassay, with the few outliers identified as uncouplers or reactive toxicants. The main limitation of the Microtox assay is that chemicals with a high melting point and/or high hydrophobicity were outside of the applicability domain because of their low water solubility. We quantitatively derived a solubility cut-off but also demonstrated with mixture experiments that chemicals inactive on their own can contribute to mixture toxicity, which is highly relevant for complex environmental mixtures, where these chemicals may be present at concentrations below the solubility cut-off.
The evaluation of single substances or environmental samples for their genotoxic or estrogenic potential is highly relevant for human- and environment-related risk assessment. To examine the effects ...on a mechanism-specific level, standardized cell-based in vitro methods are widely applied. However, these methods include animal-derived components like fetal bovine serum (FBS) or rat-derived liver homogenate fractions (S9-mixes), which are a source of variability, reduced assay reproducibility and ethical concerns.
In our study, we evaluated the adaptation of the cell-based in vitro OECD test guidelines TG 487 (assessment of genotoxicity) and TG 455 (detection of estrogenic activity) to an animal-component-free methodology. Firstly, the human cell lines A549 (for OECD TG 487), ERα-CALUX® and GeneBLAzer™ ERα-UAS-bla GripTite™ (for OECD TG 455) were investigated for growth in a chemically defined medium without the addition of FBS. Secondly, the biotechnological S9-mix ewoS9R was implemented in comparison to the induced rat liver S9 to simulate in vivo metabolism capacities in both OECD test guidelines. As a model compound, Benzoapyrene was used due to its increased genotoxicity and endocrine activity after metabolization. The metabolization of BenzoaPyrene by S9-mixes was examined via chemical analysis.
All cell lines (A549, ERα-CALUX® and GeneBLAzer™ Erα-UAS-bla GripTite™) were successfully cultivated in chemically defined media without FBS. The micronucleus assay could not be conducted in chemically defined medium due to formation of cell clusters. The methods for endocrine activity assessment could be conducted in chemically defined media or reduced FBS content, but with decreased assay sensitivity. The biotechnological ewoS9R showed potential to replace rat liver S9 in the micronucleus in FBS-medium with A549 cells and in the ERα-CALUX® assay in FBS- and chemically defined medium.
Our study showed promising steps towards an animal-component free toxicity testing. After further improvements, the new methodology could lead to more reproducible and reliable results for risk assessment.
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•Animal-derived components in in vitro assays are a source of assay variability.•OECD guidelines 455 and 458 were evaluated for replacement of animal components.•ERα-CALUX®, A549 and GeneBLAzer™ ERα-UAS-bla GripTite™ cells were adapted to CDM.•Rat-S9 and biotechnological S9 were applied in estrogenic and genotoxicity testing.•in vitro estrogenicity assessment was evaluated as animal-component free method.
Exposure assessment in in vitro cell-based bioassays is challenging for ionizable organic chemicals (IOCs), because they are present as more than one chemical species in the bioassay medium. ...Furthermore, compared to neutral organic chemicals, their binding to medium proteins and lipids is driven by more complex molecular interactions. Total medium concentrations (C total,medium) and/or freely dissolved medium concentrations (C free,medium) were determined for one neutral chemical and 14 IOCs (acids, bases, multifunctional) at concentrations relevant for determination of cytotoxicity and effect. C free,medium was measured in two in vitro bioassays at the time of dosing and after 24 h of incubation using solid-phase microextraction. C free,medium was maximally 1.7 times lower than the nominal concentrations (C nom) for the hydrophilic chemicals (caffeine and lamotrigine). For the organic acids (naproxen, ibuprofen, warfarin, and diclofenac), C free,medium was by a factor of 4 lower than C nom at high concentrations, but the ratio was much higher at low concentrations, indicating a nonlinear binding behavior. The experimental C free,medium was also compared with C free,medium predicted with a mass balance model accounting for binding to medium proteins and lipids. The mass balance model performed well for five of the test chemicals (within a factor of 10), but it underestimated C free,medium by up to a factor of 1200 for chemicals that showed nonlinear binding to medium components. These findings emphasize that experimental exposure assessment is required for improved understanding of in vitro toxicity data.
Improved understanding of chemical exposure in in vitro bioassays is required for quantitative in vitro–in vivo extrapolation (QIVIVE). In this study, we quantified freely dissolved concentrations in ...medium sampled from in vitro cell-based bioassays (
C
free,medium
) for nine chemicals with different hydrophobicity and speciation at the time point of dosing and after an incubation period of 24 h using solid-phase microextraction. The chemicals were tested in two reporter gene assays, the AREc32 assay indicative of the oxidative stress response and the PPARγ-GeneBLAzer assay that responds to chemicals which bind to the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma. For seven of the nine chemicals,
C
free,medium
did not change significantly over time in both assays and the experimentally determined
C
free,medium
generally agreed well with predictions of a mass balance model that describes the partitioning between proteinaceous and lipidous medium constituents, cells and the aqueous phase. Two chemicals showed a decrease of
C
free,medium
in the AREc32 assay over time that was probably caused by cellular metabolism. Furthermore,
C
free,medium
of the acidic chemical diclofenac deviated from the model predictions by more than a factor of 10 at higher concentrations, which indicates nonlinear binding and saturation of the medium proteins. Bioassay results are typically reported as nominal effect concentrations (EC
nom
), although it is established that freely dissolved effect concentrations (EC
free
) are a better measure for the bioavailable dose and the method developed here provides a simple experimental approach to measure and model EC
free
in in vitro bioassay for improved QIVIVE models.
High-throughput in vitro reporter gene assays are increasingly applied to assess the potency of chemicals to alter specific cellular signaling pathways. Genetically modified reporter gene cell lines ...provide stable readouts of the activation of cellular receptors or transcription factors of interest, but such reporter gene assays have been criticized for not capturing cellular metabolism. We characterized the metabolic activity of the widely applied AREc32 (human breast cancer MCF-7), ARE-bla (human liver cancer HepG2), and GR-bla (human embryonic kidney HEK293) reporter gene cells in the absence and in the presence of benzoapyrene (BaP), an AhR ligand known to upregulate cytochrome P450 in vitro and in vivo. We combined fluorescence microscopy with chemical analysis, real-time PCR, and ethoxyresorufin-O-deethylase activity measurements to track temporal changes in BaP and its metabolites in the cells and surrounding medium over time in relation to the expression and activity of metabolic enzymes. Decreasing BaP concentrations and formation of metabolites agreed with the high basal CYP1 activity of ARE-bla and the strong CYP1A1 mRNA induction in AREc32, whereas BaP concentrations were constant in GR-bla, in which neither metabolites nor CYP1 induction was detected. The study emphasizes that differences in sensitivity between reporter gene assays may be caused not only by different reporter constructs but also by a varying biotransformation rate of the evaluated parent chemical. The basal metabolic capacity of reporter gene cells in the absence of chemicals is not a clear indication because we demonstrated that the metabolic activity can be upregulated by AhR ligands during the assay. The combination of methods presented here is suitable to characterize the metabolic activity of cells in vitro and can improve the interpretation of in vitro reporter gene effect data and extrapolation to in vivo human exposure.
