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The human diet is an important factor in the development of different diseases. Lipid peroxidation during frying in edible vegetable liquid oils of food components is a mechanism leading to the formation of free radicals. Such radicals induce tissue damage and are implicated in diverse pathological conditions, including aging, atherosclerosis, brain disorders, cancer, lung disorders and various liver disorders. In the present study, we decided to investigate the genotoxic effects of four lipid peroxidation products in the in vivo Drosophila wing somatic mutation and recombination test. In this test, point mutation, chromosome breakage and mitotic recombination produce single spots; while twin spots are produced only by mitotic recombination. Drosophila is a suitable eukaryotic organism for mutagenicity studies and also its metabolism is quite similar to that of mammalians. Since conflicting data exist on the possible risk of several lipid peroxidation products for humans, we have selected four of them, namely acrolein, crotonaldehyde, 4-hydroxy-hexenal (4-HHE) and 4-oxo-2-nonenal (4-ONE). Especially at the highest concentrations tested all exert both mutagenic and recombinogenic effects in the Drosophila SMART assay, showing a direct dose-effect relationship. This is the first study reporting genotoxicity data in Drosophila for these compounds., (Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Highlights: [•] Drosophila was used to determine the genotoxic risk of several nanomaterials. [•] Titanium, zirconium and aluminium nanoparticles, and their ions were tested. [•] Mutation/recombination effects in wing somatic cells were determined. [•] No increases in genetic damage levels were observed in any treatment. [•] Our results contribute to increase the genotoxicity database on nanomaterials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the use of synthetic amorphous silica (SAS) is steady increasing, scarce information exists on its potential health risk. In particular few and conflictive data exist on its genotoxicity. To fill in this gap we have used Drosophila melanogaster as in vivo model test organism to detect the genotoxic activity of different SAS with different primary sizes (6, 15, 30 and 55 nm). The wing-spot assay and the comet assay in larvae haemocytes were used, and the obtained results were compared with those obtained with the microparticulated form (silicon dioxide). All compounds were administered to third instar larvae at concentrations ranging from 0.1 to 10 mM. No significant increases in the frequencies of mutant spots were observed in the wing-spot assay with any of the tested compounds. On the other hand, significant dose-dependent increases in the levels of primary DNA damage, measured by the comet assay, were observed for all the SAS evaluated but mainly when high doses (5 and 10 mM) were used. These in vivo results contribute to increase the database dealing with the potential genotoxic risk associated to SAS nanoparticles exposure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]