Ion channels are common targets of a range of environmental substances, including pharmaceuticals, toxins, metals and many organic pollutants. Patch-clamp technique is gold standard in studying ion channel characteristics, contributing to the improved accuracy in active compound identification, the increasing studies of molecular mechanism behind diseases, and the better prediction of potential toxicants. Nevertheless, low throughput and high technical capability requirement limit the application of conventional manual patch-clamp recording and an emerging transformation towards automation and simplification is rising. The evolving automated patch-clamp technique shows obvious advances over manual technique in many aspects, including reproducibility, throughput, operability and standardization. The application of emerging automated patch-clamp platform has created valuable consequences in many research areas, especially in high throughput screening. In this study, we provided an overview on the progresses made by conventional manual and emerging automated patch-clamp techniques in toxicological studies.

离子通道是一系列环境物质（包括药品，毒素，金属和许多有机污染物）的共同目标。膜片钳技术是研究离子通道特性的金标准，有助于提高活性化合物鉴定的准确性，增加对疾病背后的分子机制的研究以及更好地预测潜在毒物。然而，低通量和高技术能力要求限制了常规手动膜片钳记录的应用，并且朝着自动化和简化的新兴转变正在上升。不断发展的自动膜片钳技术在很多方面都比手工技术有了明显的进步，包括重现性，通量，可操作性和标准化。新兴的自动膜片钳平台的应用已在许多研究领域，特别是在高通量筛选中产生了宝贵的成果。在这项研究中，我们概述了毒理学研究中常规手动和新兴的自动膜片钳技术所取得的进展。