Award-winning research collaboration featured in special issue of Applied In Vitro Toxicology

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Award-winning research collaboration featured in special issue of Applied In Vitro Toxicology
News release

08 March 2017

Two new Adverse Outcome Pathways (AOPs), developed jointly by British American Tobacco (BAT) and Philip Morris International (PMI), are featured in a special issue of Applied In Vitro Toxicology (AIVT) focusing on the in vitro evaluation of next-generation nicotine products.

The published AOPs, one on hypertension and another on decreased lung function, outline the sequence of molecular events leading to these adverse outcomes, allowing the toxicological risk of certain chemicals to be assessed without the use of animal testing.

As a result, the researchers were recognised by PETA International Science Consortium (PISC) for their significant contributions to the ‘AOP Wiki’, a publicly available interactive platform for the sharing of AOP knowledge and development tools. The wiki was founded as part of a collaboration between the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre, the US Environmental Protection Agency, and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

“The use of adverse outcome pathways is a means by which mechanism-based in vitro assays and models can be developed to rapidly and accurately evaluate chemical risk without the use of animals. It is exciting to see good work recognized,” explains Dr Jim McKim, Editor-in-Chief of AIVT and Founder and CEO, IonTox, LLC.

Both studies, published last week, are available to read in the latest issue of AIVT , a peer-reviewed journal focusing on “the application of alternative in vitro testing methods for predicting adverse effects in the pharmaceutical, chemical, and personal care industries”.

The special issue, guest edited by BAT’s Dr Marianna Gaça, contains a total of ten original articles, including two additional BAT papers; our recent paper on next-generation gene sequencing , as well as a collaborative piece between BAT and Zhengzhou Tobacco Research Institute (ZTRI) on nicotine quantification techniques .

“Never before has there been such an exciting yet challenging time for the application of in vitro tools in supporting consumer product safety assessment. There is a wealth of new technologies available to enable faster, more accurate, and more physiologically relevant testing,” writes Dr Gaça in her AIVT guest editorial .

Furthermore, the special issue contains a roundtable discussion amongst leading test method developers, manufacturers, regulatory scientists, and in vitro validation experts, that explores the challenges and opportunities in harnessing 21st century in vitro toxicology testing methods for the assessment of e-cigarettes. The same expert panel, including Dr Chris Proctor, Chief Scientific Officer at BAT, will reunite for a follow-on discussion at next week’s Society of Toxicology Annual Meeting , with the session being hosted by the Institute for In Vitro Sciences (IIVS).

NOTES TO EDITORS

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