Cytotoxicity of Exfoliated Layered Vanadium Dichalcogenides

Abstract

Transition-metal Group 5 vanadium dichalcogenides have shown promising properties for many applications, such as batteries, capacitors, electrocatalysts for hydrogen production and many more. However, their toxicological effects have not yet been well understood. Here, we studied the cytotoxicity of exfoliated VS , VSe and VTe by incubating various concentrations of the materials with human lung carcinoma (A549) cells for 24 h and measuring the remaining cell viabilities after the treatment. We found that these vanadium dichalcogenides are relatively more toxic compared to Group 6 transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), namely MoS , WS and WSe . This study is important for a better understanding of the toxicity of TMDs in preparation for their actual commercialisation in the future.

Cytotoxicity of Group 5 Transition Metal Ditellurides (MTe2; M=V, Nb, Ta)

“…Furthermore, VTe 2 exhibiteds ignificant cytotoxicity towards A549 cells, whereby even at low concentrations of 25 mgmL À1 more than 50 %o ft he cells were not viable and at the highest concentration of 200 mgmL À1 less than 10 %o ft he cells remained viable.T his result is in line with previoust oxicity studies conducted on exfoliated VTe 2 , which demonstrated that VTe 2 was highly toxic. [10] On the other hand, the percentagec ell viabilityf or NbTe 2 and Ta Te 2 remained relativelyh igh( ! 60 %) even at high test materialc oncentrationsa bove 50 mgmL À1 ,i ndicating that these two Group 5t ransition metal ditellurides induce low toxicologicale ffects towardst he A549 cells.…”

“…To study the materials' toxicity, A549 cells were exposed to the test materials and the remaining cell viabilities were measured using WST-8 assay.W ST-8, am itochondrial activity-based assay,w orks on the principle that soluble formazan is produced due to cellular reduction by dehydrogenase activities in viable cells. [10,[46][47][48] By normalising the absorbance intensities obtained with ac ontrols etup, where cells were not treated with any test materials, the extent of toxicity exhibited by the Group 5 ditellurides towards A549 cellsc ouldb ed etermined. Data collected from the WST-8 assay is illustrated in Figure 3.…”

“…[2][3][4][5][6][7][8] Among2 Dn anomaterials, TMDs are deemed to be one of the most studied layered compounds due to their extraordinary electrochemical properties. [9][10][11][12] TMDs have ag eneral chemical formula of MX 2 ,w hereby M represents at ransition metal (for instance Ti,V ,N b, Ta,M o, W, and so on) of a + 4o xidation state and Xi sachalcogen (S, Se, or Te)w ith a À2o xidation state . [9,13,14] Different permutations of thesee lements give rise to approximately6 0d ifferent TMDs, where two-thirds of these compounds are reported to assumel ayereds tructures.…”

“…The cell line was specifically chosen as lung is one of the main potentialt arget organs during the processing of nanomaterials, [10,[35][36][37][38][39] and it is one of the most frequently used cell types in inhalation toxicity studies allowing easy comparison between our resultsa nd those in other reports. [10,35] The remaining cell viability of the A549 cellsa fter 24 hi ncubation with variousM Te 2 concentrations was measured and analysed using the water-soluble tetrazolium salt (WST-8) assay.F urthermore, controle xperiments were also conducted in the absence of cells to check for possible sources of particle-induced interferences between MTe 2 with cell viability assaym arkersw hichc ould cause false positive or false negative resultstob eproduced. [39][40][41] Results and Discussion…”

2D MoS2 Nanostructures for Biomedical Applications

“…Pumera's group studied the chemical composition influence on the toxicology profile of TMDC nanosheets in lung epithelial cells (A549) by MTT and WST‐8 assays. After comparison with exfoliated TMDCs containing selenide or vanadium, they found that MoS 2 nanosheets induced quite lower cytotoxic effects even at a concentration up to 0.4 mg mL −1 . Chng in their group then linked the cellular toxicity of MoS 2 nanosheets to the extent of exfoliation .…”