Project description:Acetamide (CAS 60-35-5) is detected in common foods including milk, eggs, beef, and roasted coffee beans. Chronic rodent bioassays using high doses (≥1000 mg/kg/day) suggest acetamide is a group 2B possible human carcinogen due to the induction of liver tumors. Weight-of-evidence indicates acetamide is not genotoxic, and therefore a threshold response is expected. We used a toxicogenomics approach in Wistar rats gavaged daily for 7 and 28 days to determine the benchmark dose (BMD), and investigate its mode of action from differential gene expression. Two exposure experiements were carried out in succsession. An initial dose range finding experiment used male Wistar rats gavaged daily for 7 days at 0, 30, 100, 300 and 1000 mg/kd/day. A second experiment used both male and female Wistar rats exposed for 7 and 28 days to 0, 300,500,750,1000 and 1500 mg/kg/day. No treatment related changes in terminal body weight, clinical chemistry, or histopathology were observed at doses of 30, 100, or 300 mkd. At 1000 mkd, the dose reported to elicit carcinogenesis, liver weights decreased 1.3-fold with the presence of single cell necrosis, hepatocyte vacuolization, and increased mitotic activity consistent with a 4.2 fold increase in the cell proliferation index. Accordingly, plasma ALT and AST were increased 2.0- and 2.2-fold, respectively. RNA-Seq analysis identified 1 differentially expressed gene at 300 mkd, and 2,685 at 1000 mkd (|fold-change| ≥ 1.5 and FDR ≤ 0.05). Down-regulated genes were associated with lipid metabolism while up-regulated genes included cell signaling, immune response, and cell cycle functions. Collectively, these results revealed a no-observable adverse effect level (NOAEL) and no-observed-transcriptional effect level (NOTEL) at 300 mkd, warranting further investigation at doses between 300 and 1000 mkd to identify the benchmark dose (BMD). Functional enrichment indicates perturbation of cell cycle and lipid metabolism, though a more refined dose-response evaluation will be needed to demonstrate dose-dependent effects related to the MOA of acetamide. Funding by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (OPP1142801).

Project description:The application of toxicogenomics as a predictive tool for chemical risk assessment has been under evaluation by the toxicology community for more than a decade. However, toxicogenomics predominately remains a tool for investigative research rather than for regulatory risk assessment. In this study, we aimed to determine whether the current generation of microarray technology in combination with an in vitro experimental design was capable of generating robust, reproducible data of sufficient quality to show promise as a tool for regulatory risk assessment. To this end, we designed a prospective collaborative study to determine the level of inter- and intra-laboratory reproducibility between three independent laboratories. All test sites adopted the same protocols for all aspects of the toxicogenomic experiment including cell culture, chemical exposure, RNA extraction, microarray data generation and analysis. As a case study, the genotoxic carcinogen B[a]P and the human hepatocyte cell line HepG2 were used to generate three comparable toxicogenomic data sets. High levels of technical reproducibility were demonstrated using a widely employed gene expression microarray platform. While differences at the global transcriptome level were still observed between the test sites, a common subset of B[a]P responsive genes was identified across all test sites which included both genes previously reported in the literature as B[a]P responsive in addition to the same most highly up and down regulated genes. Pending further analysis, these preliminary data show promise that the current generation of microarray technology in combination with a standard in vitro experimental design can produce robust data that can be reproducibly generated in independent laboratories. Future work will need to determine whether in vitro model(s) can be not only reproducible but also predictive for a range of toxic chemicals with different mechanisms of action. Such an approach may potentially be part of future in vitro testing regimes for regulatory risk assessment.

Project description:The application of toxicogenomics as a predictive tool for chemical risk assessment has been under evaluation by the toxicology community for more than a decade. However, toxicogenomics predominately remains a tool for investigative research rather than for regulatory risk assessment. In this study, we aimed to determine whether the current generation of microarray technology in combination with an in vitro experimental design was capable of generating robust, reproducible data of sufficient quality to show promise as a tool for regulatory risk assessment. To this end, we designed a prospective collaborative study to determine the level of inter- and intra-laboratory reproducibility between three independent laboratories. All test sites adopted the same protocols for all aspects of the toxicogenomic experiment including cell culture, chemical exposure, RNA extraction, microarray data generation and analysis. As a case study, the genotoxic carcinogen B[a]P and the human hepatocyte cell line HepG2 were used to generate three comparable toxicogenomic data sets. High levels of technical reproducibility were demonstrated using a widely employed gene expression microarray platform. While differences at the global transcriptome level were still observed between the test sites, a common subset of B[a]P responsive genes was identified across all test sites which included both genes previously reported in the literature as B[a]P responsive in addition to the same most highly up and down regulated genes. Pending further analysis, these preliminary data show promise that the current generation of microarray technology in combination with a standard in vitro experimental design can produce robust data that can be reproducibly generated in independent laboratories. Future work will need to determine whether in vitro model(s) can be not only reproducible but also predictive for a range of toxic chemicals with different mechanisms of action. Such an approach may potentially be part of future in vitro testing regimes for regulatory risk assessment. The aim of this study was to evaluate the inter- and intra-laboratory reproducibility of toxicogenomics data for toxicity testing in a regulatory setting. 3 Test Centres performed the same experimental protocol treating HepG2 cells with 3 mM Benzo[a]pyrene (B[a]P) (in 0.5% DMSO) for 24 hours prior to RNA extraction and microarray analysis. Three biological replicates of B[a]P and DMSO treatments were analysed by microarray analysis in each Test Centre. Two Test Centres analysed one sample in triplicate to determine technical reproducibility of the chosen array platform. One Centre analysed two samples in duplicate. 24 samples in total were used in this study

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Application of toxicogenomics for the risk assessment of the food contaminant acetamide

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