Chapter 8 - New emerging technologies for genetic toxicity testing

Abstract

Genotoxicity refers to the ability of a new chemical compound to cause alterations at the genetic level. Genetic toxicity testing is performed to identify and characterize the chemicals causing genotoxicity responsible for various diseases. This chapter describes various in silico, in vitro, and in vivo methods to evaluate genotoxicity. Computational testing is the first step of toxicity evaluation because it screens thousands of chemicals involved in the drug development phase. After screening thousands of chemicals, in vitro or in vivo tests are performed to test those chemicals. Due to less resemblance of in silico and in vitro methods with the physiological system, in vivo methods are preferred more. But they are too expensive and time-consuming. Therefore there was a need for new testing methods to overcome the limitations of present approaches. Here, we also discuss all the new emerging methods of genetic toxicity testing.