Identification of active or inactive agonists of tumor suppressor protein based on Tox21 library

Bingxin Gui1, Chen Wang1, Xiaotian Xu1

  • 1State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Wetland Ecology and Vegetation Restoration, School of Environment, Northeast Normal University, 2555 Jingyue Street, Changchun 130117 Jilin, PR China.

Toxicology
|June 6, 2022
PubMed

Insights

Identifying chemicals causing DNA damage is crucial. Machine learning models, including random forest, accurately predict genotoxicity, aiding environmental chemical risk assessment.

Area of Science:

  • Toxicology
  • Computational Chemistry
  • Genetics

Background:

  • Xenobiotic compounds can induce genotoxicity and DNA damage.
  • Rapid identification and toxicity prediction of DNA-damaging chemicals are essential.
  • The p53 pathway is a critical cellular defense against DNA damage.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To develop and compare machine learning models for predicting chemical genotoxicity.
  • To identify compounds that activate the p53 response element (p53RE).
  • To provide a basis for environmental risk assessment of organic chemicals.

Main Methods:

  • Utilized a dataset of 5036 compounds from the Tox21 library.
  • Employed recursive partitioning (RP), binary logistic regression, and random forest (RF) classifier.
  • Assessed compound activity using a β-lactamase reporter gene assay under p53RE control.

Main Results:

  • Binary logistic regression achieved 83% accuracy in distinguishing active and inactive compounds.
  • The random forest classifier demonstrated higher accuracy at 84.38%.
  • Both models effectively identified compounds inducing DNA damage and activating p53.

Conclusions:

  • Machine learning models, particularly RF, can accurately predict chemical genotoxicity.
  • These models aid in identifying DNA-damaging agents and assessing environmental chemical risks.
  • The study provides a foundation for proactive chemical safety evaluations.