Genetic Toxicology

Genetic toxicology is a subspecialty of toxicology, which uses a wide array of in silico, in vitro, and in vivo assays to measure the DNA damage that can be caused by a wide range of endogenous and exogenous agents including but not limited to biological and chemical agents. DNA damage is considered to play an important role in the initiation step (first step of three major steps) of carcinogenesis process. Genetic toxicology encompasses the study of a wide variety of DNA damage endpoints, including but not limited to mutagenicity, clastogenicity, and aneugenicity. Therefore, to increase the specificity and sensitivity of detecting DNA damage caused by myriad mechanisms, a combination of in vitro and in vivo genotoxicity assays is used, commonly referred to as “battery approach,” for predicting the rodent bioassay outcomes, considered as a gold standard assay to predict human carcinogenicity potential of a test chemical/article under investigation.