https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2022.112968

Joana Candeias^a, Elias J. Zimmermann^bc, Christoph Bisig^b, Nadine Gawlitta^bc, Sebastian Oeder^b, Thomas Gröger^b, Ralf Zimmermann^bc, Carsten B. Schmidt-Weber^a, Jeroen Buters^a
a Center Allergy & Environment (ZAUM), Member of the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Technical University Munich / Helmholtz Center Munich, Germany
^b Joint Mass Spectrometry Center (JMSC) at Comprehensive Molecular Analytics (CMA), Helmholtz Center Munich, Ingolstädter Landstraße 1, D-85764, Neuherberg, Germany
^c Joint Mass Spectrometry Center (JMSC) at Analytical Chemistry, Institute of Chemistry, University of Rostock, Dr. Lorenzweg 2, D-18051, Rostock, Germany

Human bronchial epithelial BEAS-2B cells were exposed to native birch pollen (real life intact pollen, not pollen extracts) at the air-liquid interface (pollen-ALI). BEAS-2B cells were also pre-exposed in a diesel-ALI to diesel CAST for 2 h (a model for diesel exhaust) and then to pollen in the pollen-ALI 24 h later. Effects were analysed by genome wide transcriptome analysis after 2 h 25 min, 6 h 50 min and 24 h. Selected genes were confirmed by qRT-PCR.

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https://doi.org/10.3390/nano11123226

Sivakumar Murugadoss ¹, Sonja Mülhopt ², Silvia Diabaté ³, Manosij Ghosh ¹, Hanns-Rudolf Paur ²,
Dieter Stapf ², Carsten Weiss ³, and Peter H. Hoet ¹,

¹ Laboratory of Toxicology, Unit of Environment and Health, Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium
² Institute for Technical Chemistry, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76021 Karlsruhe, Germany
³ Institute of Biological and Chemical Systems—Biological Information Processing, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76021 Karlsruhe, Germany

In this study, they investigated the influence of agglomeration on the deposition and cytotoxic potency of TiO₂ NMs at the ALI. Our results indicate that dose deposition and the cytotoxic potential are influenced by agglomeration, particularly for nano-sized TiO₂ particles.

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https://doi.org/10.3390/nano11071685

Matthias Hufnagel ¹, Nadine May ², Johanna Wall ¹, Nadja Wingert ³, Manuel Garcia-Käufer ³, Ali Arif ³, Christof Hübner ⁴, Markus Berger ⁵, Sonja Mülhopt ², Werner Baumann ², Frederik Weis ⁶, Tobias Krebs ⁵, Wolfgang Becker ⁴, Richard Gminski ³, Dieter Stapf ², and Andrea Hartwig ¹,

¹ Department of Food Chemistry and Toxicology, Institute of Applied Biosciences, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76131 Karlsruhe, Germany;
² Institute for Technical Chemistry, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany; 
³ Institute for Infection Prevention and Hospital Epidemiology, Medical Center—University of Freiburg, Faculty of Medicine, University of Freiburg, 79110 Freiburg, Germany;
⁴ Fraunhofer Institute of Chemical Technology, 76327 Pfinztal, Germany; 
⁵ Vitrocell® Systems GmbH, 79183 Waldkirch, Germany; 
⁶ Palas GmbH, 76229 Karlsruhe, Germany; 

This study was the first to investigate the toxicological effects of well characterized aerosols released during combustion of thermoplastic nanocomposites using an air–liquid interface exposure system. Even though studies on the toxicological potential of combustion-generated particulate matter as well as VOCs have been published, none of them was designed to investigate the effect of the native aerosol using appropriate realistic lung cell culture models. In the current study we investigated the combustion behavior of PE-based nanocomposites on a lab-scale burner. As nanoscaled fillers TiO2 NP, CuO NP, as well as CNT were chosen for this study, with TiO2 NP representing a commonly used insoluble and inert nanomaterial, CuO NP as a known in vitro cyto- as well as genotoxic nanomaterial, and CNT as a fiber-shaped nanomaterial.

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doi:10.3390/rs12040648

Patrick Augustin ¹, Sylvain Billet ² , Suzanne Crumeyrolle ³, Karine Deboudt ¹, Elsa Dieudonné ¹ , Pascal Flament ¹ , Marc Fourmentin ¹ , Sarah Guilbaud ¹, Benjamin Hanoune ⁴ , Yann Landkocz ², Clémence Méausoone ², Sayahnya Roy ⁵, François G. Schmitt ⁵, Alexei Sentchev ⁵ and Anton Sokolov ^1
1 Univ. Littoral Côte d’Opale, UR 4493—LPCA—Laboratoire de Physico-Chimie de l’Atmosphère, 59140 Dunkerque, France;
² Univ. Littoral Côte d’Opale, SFR Condorcet FR CNRS 3417, UR 4492—UCEiV—Unité de Chimie Environnementale et Interactions sur le Vivant, 59140 Dunkerque, France; 
³ Univ. Lille, CNRS, UMR 8518—LOA—Laboratoire d’Optique Atmosphérique, 59000 Lille, France;
⁴ Univ. Lille, CNRS, UMR 8522—PC2A—Physico-Chimie des Processus de Combustion et de l’Atmosphère, 59000 Lille, France; 
⁵ Univ. Lille, Univ. Littoral Côte d’Opale, CNRS, UMR 8187—LOG—Laboratoire d’Océanologie et de Géosciences, F 62930 Wimereux, France; 

An atmospheric mobile unit was implemented during a field campaign performed at a representative site of urbanized and industrialized coastal environment of the North Sea (Northern France), to study the impact of sea breeze dynamics on aerosol properties, and especially their toxicity. This unit combined aerosol samplers, two scanning lidars (Doppler and elastic), two aerosol particle sizers and an air-liquid interface (ALI, Vitrocell) in vitro cell exposure device. This study is one of the first to bring cell cultures into the field to evaluate the harmfulness of a real environmental compartment. Atmospheric toxicity in the presence or absence of sea breeze was demonstrated in human bronchial cells exposed in the field using an ALI exposure system. The study showed the sensitivity of the developed device to discriminate the mechanisms of toxic action activated when exposed to different atmospheres.

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DOI:10.3791/61210 

Hedwig M. Braakhuis^₁, Ruiwen He^1,2, Rob J. Vandebriel¹, Eric R. Gremmer¹, Edwin Zwart¹, Jolanda P. Vermeulen¹, Paul Fokkens¹, John Boere¹, Ilse Gosens¹, Flemming R. Cassee^1,2 
1National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) 
²Institute for Risk Assessment Sciences (IRAS) 

This article provides a method for culturing and exposing the human bronchial epithelial cell line Calu-37 at the Air-liquid Interface that mimics realistic, repeated inhalation exposure conditions that can be used for toxicity testing. By applying a continuous airflow using the Automated Exposure System, the cell model can be exposed to a low concentration of particles over a longer time period, reflecting realistic exposure conditions. Characteristics of both the cell model and of  the exposure system are essential for achieving a realistic inhalation exposure model that can be used for repeated exposures. 

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