The Toxic Effects of Polystyrene Microplastics on Colonic Epithelial NCM460 Cells

Lots of recent studies focused on the impact of microplastics on human health and investigates the location of it inside the body. Most of the study aiming to orient the traces of polystyrene microplastic use a kind which pigments were added inside making it easier to be observed. But weather the treate particles could replace the original one? The following study was set to investigate the impact of original or marked polystyrene microplastic (PS MPs) on NCM460 cells and how the pigments within could have impact on them. Cells experienced a bath of different concentration(100μg/mL, 200μg/mL, 400μg/mL) of two different formulas including PS and colored PS. Cell Counting Kit - 8 (CCK - 8) assay was used to detect the cell viability. The result shows that, first, PS MPs do have an negative impact on the and the viability. On top of it, pigments also has significant impact on the result tested by the colored ones. CCK data decreased while ROS increased illustrating that oxidative stresses could also be triggered by PS MPs and the colored one. In a word, PS MPs do have an impact on human cells and colored ones increases the damage, as a result, colored ones shouldn't be seen as the substitute for the original PS MPs. This work provides theoretical foundations for the investigation of distribution within scientific studies.