Genome-Wide Approach in Arabidopsis thaliana to Assess the Toxicity of Cadmium Sulfide Quantum Dots

Abstract

Cadmium sulfide quantum dots (CdS QDs) are used in the manufacture of a number of electronics products. Their small size allows their ready entry into living cells, but as yet no attempt has been made to assess their toxicity. Our aim was to exploit two Ds transposition-induced mutant lines of Arabidopsis thaliana which tolerated exposure to CdS QDs to identify the genetic basis of their tolerance. Both a genome-wide top-down (from mutant to genes) and a bottom-up (from gene expression to phenotype) approach were applied. The differential responses of the mutants compared to the wild type showed that sensitivity to CdS QDs was unrelated to sensitivity to Cd(2+) ions. A transcriptomic analysis identified a number of genes whose transcript abundance was correlated with the tolerance. The phenotype of one of the mutants was correlated with the overexpression of ELM2, an MYB containing gene visited by a Ds transposon. Segregation analysis showed that the genetic basis of CdS QDs tolerance in both mutants was monogenic. The phenotype of the other mutant could be explained by the mutation of HCF101, a gene involved in photosynthesis.

Toxicity assessment of repeated intravenous injections of arginine–glycine–aspartic acid peptide conjugated CdSeTe/ZnS quantum dots in mice

“…[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] Our study demonstrates for the first time that at the dose needed to produce in vivo tumor imaging, there is no short-term toxicity of QD800-RGD in mice after repeated intravenous injections, which provides invaluable information for the clinical application of QD800-RGD. Additional study is needed to further elucidate the dose-toxicity relationship of QD800-RGD in mice and its long-term toxicity and metabolic fates.…”

“…[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] In this study, the outer coating of QD800 is amino-derivatized polyethylene glycol; therefore, QD800 is highly cationic under physiological conditions. 30 On the basis of the size of QD800, we estimated that there are about 80-100 amino groups on the surface of each QD800.…”

“…[12][13][14] Since there is a large number of functionalized QDs species, each having different physical and chemical properties, their toxicity varies greatly. A number of factors have been demonstrated to impact the toxicity of QDs, [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] such as the composition of the QD core, particle size, exposure concentration, exposure time, the physical and chemical properties of the coating material, environmental condition, administration manner, and the types of targeted cells. Therefore, QDs cannot be generally defined as toxic or nontoxic.…”

Oxidative stress-induced toxicity of CuO nanoparticles and related toxicogenomic responses in Arabidopsis thaliana

“…For nanotoxicological investigation, the microarray technology has been applied to detect changes in gene expression in human cells (Li et al, 2014), zebrafish embryos (Van Aerle et al, 2013), and bacteria (Escherichia coli) (Cui et al, 2012). For plants, microarray has been applied to detect changes in gene expression in plants exposed to and CdS quantum dots (QDs) (Marmiroli et al, 2014(Marmiroli et al, , 2015 and Ag NPs (Kaveh et al, 2013). Marmiroli et al (2014) reported that sensitivity of Arabidopsis thaliana to CdS QDs was not due to the released Cd 2þ ions according to differential responses of Arabidopsis genes.…”

“…For plants, microarray has been applied to detect changes in gene expression in plants exposed to and CdS quantum dots (QDs) (Marmiroli et al, 2014(Marmiroli et al, , 2015 and Ag NPs (Kaveh et al, 2013). Marmiroli et al (2014) reported that sensitivity of Arabidopsis thaliana to CdS QDs was not due to the released Cd 2þ ions according to differential responses of Arabidopsis genes. On the contrary, the investigation on Ag NPs revealed that differentially expressed genes and stress induced by Ag NPs originated from both the particulate Ag NPs and released Ag þ ions (Kaveh et al, 2013).…”