Materials and toxicological approaches to study metal and metal-oxide nanoparticles in the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans

Abstract

Understanding the in vivo fate and transport of nanoparticles (NPs) is challenging, but critical. We review recent studies of metal and metal oxide NPs using the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans, summarizing major findings to date. In a joint transdisciplinary effort, we highlight underutilized opportunities offered by powerful techniques lying at the intersection of mechanistic toxicology and materials science,. To this end, we firstly summarize the influence of exposure conditions (media, duration, C. elegans lifestage) and NP physicochemical properties (size, coating, composition) on the response of C. elegans to NP treatment. Next, we focus on the techniques employed to study NP entrance route, uptake, biodistribution and fate, emphasizing the potential of extending the toolkit available with novel and powerful techniques. Next, we review findings on several NP-induced biological responses, namely transport routes and altered molecular pathways, and illustrate the molecular biology and genetic strategies applied, critically reviewing their strengths and weaknesses. Finally, we advocate the incorporation of a set of minimal materials and toxicological science experiments that will permit meta-analysis and synthesis of multiple studies in the future. We believe this review will facilitate coordinated integration of both well-established and underutilized approaches in mechanistic toxicology and materials science by the nanomaterials research community.

Toxicity Evaluation of One-Dimensional Nanoparticles Using Caenorhabditis elegans: A Comparative Study of Halloysite Nanotubes and Chitin Nanocrystals

“…Over the past decades, it has been proved that C. elegans can be used as an animal model for studies on toxicity. , Considering these advantages including a short life cycle, a small size, good transparency, and a fully sequenced genome, C. elegans was often chosen as the priority model to elucidate the toxicity mechanism. ,− Previous studies demonstrated that C.…”

Research Advances on the Adverse Effects of Nanomaterials in a Model Organism, Caenorhabditis elegans

“…The different exposure media for C. elegans are either liquid or solid (Gonzalez‐Moragas et al 2017). The stability and uniformity of NPs should be maintained as much as possible, to ensure repeatability of the experiment.…”

“…It is an ideal model animal for studying neurobiology and developmental biology (Brenner 1974). To date, nanotoxicological studies using C. elegans have shown that exposure to particular concentrations of certain NPs causes multiple adverse effects in different systems of C. elegans through different toxicity pathways (Gonzalez‐Moragas et al 2017). Thus C. elegans has become a widely used biological model for assessing the toxicity of nanotechnology products and their potential mechanisms.…”

Carbon Nanotubes and Other Engineered Nanoparticles Induced Pathophysiology on Mesothelial Cells and Mesothelial Membranes

“…Rodents do not accurately mimic human physiology and pathophysiology in terms of exposure, injury and clearance of nanoparticles. In that aspect a gradual swift to well characterized relevant human in vitro models, invertebrate animal models and in silico simulations will be needed to limit the use of high numbers of animals and to produce large volume of data needed (Braakhuis et al, 2015 ; Clippinger et al, 2016 ; Polk et al, 2016 ; Sharma et al, 2016 ; Chen et al, 2017 ; Gonzalez-Moragas et al, 2017 ).…”