Nanoparticle biological assays: In vitro cell lines compared with zebrafish whole-organism models

One can find almost any answer desired in the current nanoparticle toxicity literature for various nanoparticle types. Most in vitro assays are not definitive, cell lines are poor substitutes for the human physiome, most nanomaterials are not standardized or referenced to standards, and most particle dosings are arbitrary and often grossly over-dosed compared to expected reasonable particle exposure. Nanoparticle analysis tools are frequently inadequate to describe details on particle surface chemistry required to correlate nanoparticle high specific surface areas with their biological interactions with proteins or cells. This seminar will discuss these metrics and analytical performance issues, and compare recent in vitro assay data for carbon-based and silver nanoparticles with toxicity results from cell lines and zebrafish whole-organism assays.