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Updated: Sep 26, 2025

Cytotoxicity Assays with Zebrafish Cell Lines
Published on: January 6, 2023
Different toxicity to liver and gill of zebrafish by selenium nanoparticles derived from bio/chemical methods
Shuling Fan1, Ying Yang1, Lu Sun1
1Key Laboratory of Industrial Ecology and Environmental Engineering (Ministry of Education), School of Environmental Science and Technology, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, 116024, China.
Abstract:
With the wide application of selenium nanoparticles (SeNPs) in pharmaceutical fields, the toxicity assessment is of great significance. In this study, zebrafish were selected as model organisms to compare the toxicity of SeNPs derived from biological and chemical methods. The results showed that the size of bio-SeNPs was about 5-fold bigger than chem-SeNPs. When exposed to SeNPs for 96 h, LC50 of bio-SeNPs and chem-SeNPs was 1.668 mg/L and 0.699 mg/L, respectively. Compared with the control, the results showed a significant increase in oxidative toxicity index (P < 0.05), such as glutathione (GSH), superoxide dismutase (SOD) of the liver, and gill in SeNPs-treated group. The neurotoxicity index, such as acetylcholinesterase (AchE) and Na+-K+-ATP enzyme activity, was significantly decreased both in the liver and gill (P < 0.05). It was found that the toxicity of bio-SeNPs to the liver and gill of zebrafish was lower than chem-SeNPs and the toxicity to the liver was higher than gill. In this study, the toxicity of chem-SeNPs and bio-SeNPs to the target organs of zebrafish were systematically evaluated, which provided the basis for the safe application of SeNPs synthesized by different pathways.

