In Vitro High-Throughput Toxicological Assessment of Nanoplastics

Valentina Tolardo; Davide Magrì; Francesco Fumagalli; Domenico Cassano; Athanassia Athanassiou; Despina Fragouli; Sabrina Gioria

doi:10.3390/nano12121947

In Vitro High-Throughput Toxicological Assessment of Nanoplastics

Nanomaterials (Basel). 2022 Jun 7;12(12):1947. doi: 10.3390/nano12121947.

Authors

Valentina Tolardo^{1

2}, Davide Magrì³, Francesco Fumagalli³, Domenico Cassano³, Athanassia Athanassiou¹, Despina Fragouli¹, Sabrina Gioria³

Affiliations

¹ Smart Materials, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Via Morego, 30, 16163 Genova, Italy.
² Department of Informatics, Bioengineering, Robotics and Systems Engineering, University of Genova, Via All' Opera Pia, 13, 16145 Genova, Italy.
³ European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC), 21027 Ispra, Italy.

Abstract

Sub-micrometer particles derived from the fragmentation of plastics in the environment can enter the food chain and reach humans, posing significant health risks. To date, there is a lack of adequate toxicological assessment of the effects of nanoplastics (NPs) in mammalian systems, particularly in humans. In this work, we evaluated the potential toxic effects of three different NPs in vitro: two NPs obtained by laser ablation (polycarbonate (PC) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET1)) and one (PET2) produced by nanoprecipitation. The physicochemical characterization of the NPs showed a smaller size, a larger size distribution, and a higher degree of surface oxidation for the particles produced by laser ablation. Toxicological evaluation performed on human cell line models (HePG2 and Caco-2) showed a higher toxic effect for the particles synthesized by laser ablation, with PC more toxic than PET. Interestingly, on differentiated Caco-2 cells, a conventional intestinal barrier model, none of the NPs produced toxic effects. This work wants to contribute to increase knowledge on the potential risks posed by NPs.

Keywords: cytotoxicity; high content screening; in vitro assays; laser ablation; nanoplastics; nanotoxicology; polycarbonate; polyethylene terephthalate.

Grants and funding

This work was carried out in the frame of the JRC Visiting Scientist agreement no. 07/JRC.F.2/2021 (Directorate F—Health, Consumers and Reference Materials, Consumer Products Safety, Nanobiotechnology Lab).