Open Access
REVIEW
Carbon nanotubes: A review on risks assessment, mechanism of toxicity and future directives to prevent health implication
PIYOOSH KUMAR BABELE1,2,#,*, MAHENDRA KUMAR VERMA2,#, RAVI KANT BHATIA3,#
1 College of Agriculture, Rani Laxmi Bai Central Agriculture University, Jhansi, 284003, India
2 Department of Biological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Bhopal (IISERB), Bhopal, 462066, India
3 Department of Biotechnology, Himachal Pradesh University, Shimla, 171005, India
* Address correspondence to: Piyoosh Kumar Babele,
# These authors contributed equally to this work
(This article belongs to this Special Issue: Biomonitoring of Toxic Effects Using OMICs Markers)
BIOCELL 2021, 45(2), 267-279. https://doi.org/10.32604/biocell.2021.013409
Received 12 August 2020; Accepted 11 November 2020; Issue published 19 February 2021
Abstract
Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have tremendous applications in almost every walk of life; however, their harmful
impacts on humans and the environment are not well addressed. CNTs have been used in various applications ranging
from medical science to different engineering branches, to ease human life. Generally, the toxicological profile of CNTs
under laboratory conditions cannot be assessed primarily in medical science due to the inconsistent availability of
cytotoxic study data. CNT toxicity has been affected by many physicochemical properties (e.g., size, type of
functionalization), concentration, the extent of exposure, mode of exposure, and even the solvents/medium used to
dissolve/disperse CNTs for their application. These inconsistencies arise due to the variation in synthesis methods as
well as the mode of their human exposure. Besides their unlimited use in various fields, most of CNT toxicity aspects
and mechanisms remain uncertain. Additionally, in-depth knowledge of CNTs toxicity is scarce, and the available
literature shows dissimilarities in experimental data and exposure studies. To understand the toxicological issues, it is
the need of the hour to provide insight into the published data, post-exposure studies, and various factors that may
damage the cells due to CNTs toxicity. This review article analyses the hazardous potential through toxicological
implications and summarizes the detailed mechanism(s) of CNTs studied on the different model organisms, including
human cell lines. In this review article, we hypothesized that thorough knowledge of various aspects, as mentioned
above, helps us design and develop possible strategies to reduce the toxicity of nanomaterial to make them safer and
secure for humanity’s betterment.
Keywords
Cite This Article
BABELE, P. K., VERMA, M. K., BHATIA, R. K. (2021). Carbon nanotubes: A review on risks assessment, mechanism of toxicity and future directives to prevent health implication.
BIOCELL, 45(2), 267–279. https://doi.org/10.32604/biocell.2021.013409