nn9b08938_si_001.pdf (4.31 MB)
Redox Activity and Nano–Bio Interactions Determine the Skin Injury Potential of Co3O4‑Based Metal Oxide Nanoparticles toward Zebrafish
journal contribution
posted on 2020-03-24, 11:04 authored by Guotao Peng, Yuan He, Xiaoxiao Wang, Yan Cheng, Haiyuan Zhang, Kai Savolainen, Lutz Mädler, Suman Pokhrel, Sijie LinRedox-active
metal oxide nanoparticles show varying oxidizing capacities
and injury potentials toward biological systems. Here, two metal oxide
libraries including transition-metal-doped Co3O4 and PdO-Co3O4 with strong chemical contacts
were design-synthesized and used to investigate their biological injury
potential and mechanisms using zebrafish as a model organism. Among
different dopants, Cu significantly increased the oxidizing capacity
of Co3O4. An increased amount of PdO resulted
in higher density of heterojunctions, which also led to higher oxidizing
capacity. The oxidizing capacity of these nanoparticles was positively
correlated with higher mortality of dechorionated embryos and severe
larval skin injury upon exposure. Using transgenic zebrafish Tg(LysC:eGFP), we show in real time that
the redox-active nanoparticles induced skin injury and activated the
infiltration of immune cells. Such inflammatory response was confirmed
by the increased mRNA expression level of Nrf2a, HO-1, IL-1β, and IL-6 genes.
Although the exposure to the nanoparticles alone was not lethal, the
skin injury did lower the tolerance level against other environmental
contaminants. More importantly, after withdrawing from the nanoparticle
exposure, larvae with skin injury could recover within 24 h in uncontaminated
medium, indicating such injury was transient and recoverable.