Low Toxicological Impact of Commercial Pristine Multi-Walled Carbon Nanotubes on the Yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

Sonia Martel Martín,Rocío Barros,Matteo Poddighe,Carlos Rumbo,Santiago Aparicio,Brixhilda Domi,Maria Suarez-Diez,Juan Antonio Tamayo-Ramos

doi:10.3390/nano11092272

Abstract

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have attracted the attention of academy and industry due to their potential applications, being currently produced and commercialized at a mass scale, but their possible impact on different biological systems remains unclear. In the present work, an assessment to understand the toxicity of commercial pristine multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) on the unicellular fungal model Saccharomyces cerevisiae is presented. Firstly, the nanomaterial was physico-chemically characterized, to obtain insights concerning its morphological features and elemental composition. Afterwards, a toxicology assessment was carried out, where it could be observed that cell proliferation was negatively affected only in the presence of 800 mg L−1 for 24 h, while oxidative stress was induced at a lower concentration (160 mg L−1) after a short exposure period (2 h). Finally, to identify possible toxicity pathways induced by the selected MWCNTs, the transcriptome of S. cerevisiae exposed to 160 and 800 mg L−1, for two hours, was studied. In contrast to a previous study, reporting massive transcriptional changes when yeast cells were exposed to graphene nanoplatelets in the same exposure conditions, only a small number of genes (130) showed significant transcriptional changes in the presence of MWCNTs, in the higher concentration tested (800 mg L−1), and most of them were found to be downregulated, indicating a limited biological response of the yeast cells exposed to the selected pristine commercial CNTs.

Highlights

Introduction iationsCarbon nanotubes (CNTs) have attracted the attention of the scientific community and industry stakeholders due to their wide array of potential applications [1,2], being currently produced and commercialized at a mass scale by large enterprises [3]
NTX1 CNTs were selected as the production of 100% pure multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) is rare, due to the presence of metal catalysts during the production process [23]
Purity MWCNTs are of relevance for certain applications due to their metal impurities content, which confer important electromagnetic properties [24]

Summary

Introduction

Introduction iationsCarbon nanotubes (CNTs) have attracted the attention of the scientific community and industry stakeholders due to their wide array of potential applications [1,2], being currently produced and commercialized at a mass scale by large enterprises [3]. Considering the increasing applications, some studies indicate low bioaccumulation [4], there is a growing likelihood of CNT release into the environment, which could lead to human and ecosystem exposure with potentially harmful effects [5,6]. For this reason, the identification of possible safety issues related to the generation, utilization, and disposal of CNT-based materials is essential, as well as their toxicological assessment, in view of possible biomedical and biotechnological applications [7].

Methods

Results

Conclusion