Testing the Genotoxic Potential of Nanomaterials Using Drosophila

Abstract

Nanogenotoxicology is an emergent area of research aiming to determine the potential risk of nanomaterials. Since most of the established studies use in vitro approaches, neglecting the repair and metabolic properties of the whole organism, some doubts about the accuracy of the obtained results exist. To overcome this gap more in vivo approaches testing the potential genotoxic risk of nanomaterials are required. In this context we propose to use Drosophila melanogaster as a useful model to study the possible genotoxic risk associated to nanoparticles exposure. Until now, only few studies have been carried out and they all use the wing-spot assay that detects the induction of somatic mutation and recombination events in the wing imaginal disks. This test is based on the principle that the loss of heterozygosis and the corresponding expression of the suitable recessive markers, multiple wing hairs and flare-3, can lead to the formation of mutant clone cells in growing up larvae, which are expressed as mutant spots on the wings of adult flies. The protocol to perform the wing-spot assay is presented.