Backgrounds

Heavy metals cadmium has been used as a yellow pigment due to its bright and lasting color. Considering the toxicity of cadmium, yellow iron oxide has been suggested as a substitute due to its cost-effectiveness. However, cellular and molecular safety information of yellow iron oxide is not fully understood.

Methods

Metal-mediated cellular stress indicated by metallothionein 1 expression were measured by western blotting and qRT-PCR in cadmium- or iron oxide-treated HepG2 cells. Genotoxicity were detected using comet assay and micronuclei assay in HepG2 cells and rat liver tissue. Observed toxicological effects were quantified and scored on a scale bar for integrated analysis.

Results

Yellow iron oxide showed significantly low metallothionein 1 expression and genotoxicity in all results. This result indicates high potential of iron oxide as an alternative to cadmium.

Conclusion

We demonstrated the comparative toxicity of the cadmium and yellow iron oxide in terms of stress-responsive biomarker expression and genotoxicity in HepG2 cells and rat liver tissue. Our study with the integrated strategy suggests usefulness of the yellow iron oxide as a substitute material in cadmium-containing products and reports useful tool to comprehensively assess the toxicity of suspected toxicants or newly developed materials.

中文翻译：

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镉和氧化铁作为黄色颜料的整体比较在体内和体外的细胞应激和遗传毒性方面

背景资料

重金属镉由于其明亮而持久的颜色已被用作黄色颜料。考虑到镉的毒性，由于其成本效益，有人建议使用氧化铁黄作为替代品。但是，尚未完全了解黄色氧化铁的细胞和分子安全性信息。

方法

通过蛋白质印迹和qRT-PCR测量了镉或铁氧化物处理的HepG2细胞中金属硫蛋白1表达所指示的金属介导的细胞应激。使用彗星试验和微核试验检测HepG2细胞和大鼠肝组织的遗传毒性。量化观察到的毒理作用，并在比例尺上打分以进行综合分析。

结果

黄色氧化铁在所有结果中均显示出较低的金属硫蛋白1表达和遗传毒性。该结果表明氧化铁作为镉的替代品的潜力很大。

结论

我们证明了镉和黄色氧化铁在HepG2细胞和大鼠肝组织中的应激反应性生物标志物表达和遗传毒性方面具有比较毒性。我们的综合策略研究表明，黄色氧化铁可以用作含镉产品的替代材料，并报告了有用的工具，可以全面评估可疑有毒物质或新开发材料的毒性。