Sudharsan Sankar; Sharmishta Redipalli; Indhuja Jayaraj; Soumika Ghosal; Venkatachalam Deepa Parvathi
Abstract
Background: Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) is a drug used to treat malarial parasites and it was extensively used during the initial phase of COVID-19. However, HCQ demonstrated certain serious effects when administered to patients. Hence, this study intends to determine its toxicity by exposing it to human ...
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Background: Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) is a drug used to treat malarial parasites and it was extensively used during the initial phase of COVID-19. However, HCQ demonstrated certain serious effects when administered to patients. Hence, this study intends to determine its toxicity by exposing it to human peripheral blood and the fly model.Methods: In the present experimental study, HCQ (200 mg) was tested in different volumes (62.5 μl - 500 μl) on human blood samples (in vitro) and Drosophila melanogaster (in vivo). Hemolytic assay, trypan blue assay, mitotic index, chromosomal aberration, and DNA fragmentation assay were used to assess the sublethal effects of HCQ.Results: The results implied that HCQ, at its highest concentration (500 μl), showed maximum lysis in the hemolytic assay, and an increased number of dead cells were observed with increasing concentration in trypan blue assay. Also, the percent mitotic index decreased with increasing concentration of HCQ. Chromosomal aberrations, including breaks, centromeric disruption, dicentrics, and pulverized chromosomes, were observed on exposure to HCQ. The number of fragments in agarose gel electrophoresis revealed damage to DNA. Therefore, these results provide evidence and prove the cytotoxicity and genotoxicity of HCQ.Conclusion: HCQ is found to have cytotoxic and genotoxic effects. These results imply that further examinations must be conducted before prescribing HCQ to treat various diseases.
Laya Ebrahimi; Saeid Hosseinzadeh; Maryam Pourmontaseri; Jafar Jalaei
Abstract
Background: With the advancement of nanotechnology, nanoparticles have been applied in our modern society. However, the hazardous effects of nanoparticles on organisms have not been thoroughly clarified yet. Considering the migration of nanoparticles in food and its subsequent consumption by humans, ...
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Background: With the advancement of nanotechnology, nanoparticles have been applied in our modern society. However, the hazardous effects of nanoparticles on organisms have not been thoroughly clarified yet. Considering the migration of nanoparticles in food and its subsequent consumption by humans, we have employed normal cell line, the African green monkey kidney cell line (Vero) for evaluation of the cytotoxic activity of the silver nanoparticles. Currently, there are various approaches to perform toxicity tests. In this study, we investigated the effects of citrate-based silver nanoparticles on Vero cells to explore the adverse effects of these nanoparticles. Methods: In an experimental work, to synthetize silver nanoparticles, silver nitrate and citric acid were used. Nanoparticles were further characterized by UV-Visible Spectroscopy, Dynamic Light scattering (DLS) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). Cells were exposed to various concentrations of the nanoparticles (1.56 to 1000 µg/ml) for 24 h and 48h. The cytotoxic activity and apoptosis were determined using MTT assay and acridine orange/ethidium bromide (AO/EB) staining, respectively. Results: The present study showed a dose-dependent cytotoxicity of the silver nanoparticles with log IC50 values of ~ 10.68 and 2.06 µg/ml for 24 h and 48 h, respectively on Vero cell lines. Analysis by AO/EB staining indicated that the silver nanoparticles induced apoptosis in the cell lines. Conclusion: Silver nanoparticles revealed cytotoxic effects on the Vero cells which was associated with the method of synthesis of silver nanoparticles.
