Progress in alternative testing strategies for human embryonic stem cell-based drug toxicity / 中国药理学与毒理学杂志

ABSTRACT

Traditional drug development and pre-clinical tests are based on animals and involve large numbers of animals,costs and long periods. Meanwhile,inter-species differences are difficult to overcome. Human embryonic stem cells (hESCs),which can self-renew and directly differentiate to types of cells,have become a new tool for toxicity alternative testing. hESC-Based alternative testing models,such as the reproductive toxicity test system,neuro development toxicity test system and metabolic model,can be used to predict target organ toxicity and toxic mechanisms of chemicals, analyze metabolic pathways and to search for potential toxicity biomarkers, when combined with omics such techiniques as metabonomics , proteomics and genomics. Therefore, hESC-based alternative testing models have extensive application to toxicology.