Research Methods in Life Sciences Commons^™

Accelerating The Development Of 21st-Century Toxicology: Outcome Of A Human Toxicology Project Consortium Workshop, Martin L. Stephens, Craig Barrow, Melvin E. Andersen, Kim Boekelheide, Paul L. Carmichael, Michael P. Holsapple, Mark Lafranconi

Martin Stephens, PhD

The U.S. National Research Council (NRC) report on “Toxicity Testing in the 21st century” calls for a fundamental shift in the way that chemicals are tested for human health effects and evaluated in risk assessments. The new approach would move toward in vitro methods, typically using human cells in a high-throughput context. The in vitro methods would be designed to detect significant perturbations to “toxicity pathways,” i.e., key biological pathways that, when sufficiently perturbed, lead to adverse health outcomes. To explore progress on the report’s implementation, the Human Toxicology Project Consortium hosted a workshop on 9–10 November 2010 in Washington, …