Interactions of aluminum nanoparticles with human epidermal keratinocytes

Abstract

Aluminum nanoparticles (Al NP) have been used in applications as diverse as drug delivery, material surface coatings and an ingredient for solid rocket fuel in military explosives and artillery. Although Al NP are used in many civilian and military applications, the health and safety implications of these nanosize particles are not known. To understand the interactions and biological activity of Al NP in human cells, cultured human neonatal epidermal keratinocytes (HEK) were exposed for 24 h to 50 and 80 nm Al NP in concentrations from 4.0 to 0.0004 mg ml(-1) to assess the cytotoxicity and inflammatory potential. UV-Vis measurements and nanoparticle controls revealed that the Al NP interact with the assay dyes. Viability did not decrease in HEK exposed to both the 50 and the 80 nm Al NP at all treatment concentrations with MTT, CellTiter 96 AQueous One (96 AQ) and alamar Blue (aB) viability assays. The 96 AQ and aB assays interact with the Al NP less than MTT, and proved to be the best assays to use with these Al NP. TEM depicted Al NP localized within the cytoplasmic vacuoles of the cells. Cytokine data was variable, indicating possible nanoparticle interactions with the cytokine assays. These studies illustrate the difficulties involved in assessing the biological safety of nanomaterials such as Al NP due to media- and temperature-dependent particle agglomeration and nanoparticle interactions with biomarkers of cytotoxicity.

New cationic nanovesicular systems containing lysine-based surfactants for topical administration: Toxicity assessment using representative skin cell lines

“…This might be due to a false positive reaction in which MTT was converted to formazan in the absence of cells. However, these small interferences did not result in further increases in cell viability with increasing concentration (false viability), which is in contrast to previous reported data for other types of nanomaterials [19,20]. These data prove that these viability endpoints are suitable for the intended purpose.…”

“…To determine whether the NVs interact with the viability assays, UV-visible absorbance measurements were carried out [19,20]. NVs at 100 μM were suspended in DMEM medium (without FBS and phenol red) containing MTT (0.5 mg/ml) or NR (50 μg/ml) dyes.…”

Effects of carbonaceous nanoparticles from low-emission and older diesel engines on human skin cells

“…It is well known that these cells under normal physiological conditions, due to their protective role in the skin, do not possess the ability to internalise any foreign body materials. Anyway some reports show that nanosized particles, such as nickel oxide, aluminium and silver nanoparticles are internalised by these cells [26][27][28], but it has never been reported that carbonaceous nanoparticles can be spontaneously up taken by keratinocytes. Unexpectedly, we observed that normal keratinocytes in vitro are able to take up spontaneously diesel exhaust nanoparticles after 24 h exposure.…”

Nanotoxikologie – eine interdisziplinäre Herausforderung

“…Im Sinne der Vorsorge werden auch andere Nanomaterialien wie CNTs, [85] Silbernanopartikel, [38,86] Quantenpunkte [36,87,88] oder Aluminium [89] auf ihre mögliche toxische Wirkung überprüft, wobei immer zu beachten ist, ob diese Materialien auch die Hornschicht des Stratum corneum in ausreichender Weise penetrieren können. Vermehrt werden Fullerene (C 60 ) als Radikalfänger in Kosmetika beigemischt (Vitamin C60 BioResearch Corporation; siehe http://www.vc60.com/).…”