Advantages and pitfalls of particulate brain and membranes in neurotoxicological studies

Specific neurotoxins, for instance from animal and bacterial origin, are important tools for the neurobiologist. In contrast, the neurotoxicologist deals mainly with nonspecific agents acting on many central and peripheral functions simultaneously. Specific actions are well reproducible with subcellular systems, whereas the validity of data obtained on isolated systems with nonspecific agents is to be doubted until support is found in vivo. Use of isolated systems raises the precision, reproducibility and transparency of a biological event of toxicological interest, but at the same time obscures its relevance and its predictive value.