Differential in vivo hemocyte responses to nano titanium dioxide in mussels: Effects of particle size

Titanium dioxide nanoparticles (TiO2 NPs) are widely used in various products and inevitably released with different sizes and forms into aquatic environment. The purpose of this study was to assess the differential immune toxicity of TiO2 NPs with size difference on mussel hemocytes using flow cytometry (FCM) assays. Hemocyte parameters, including total hemocyte count (THC), hemocyte mortality (HM), phagocytosis activity (PA), lysosomal content (LC), esterase activity (EA), mitochondrial number (MN), mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP) and reactive oxygen species content (ROS) were evaluated in the mussels Mytilus coruscus exposed to two types of TiO2 NPs (25nm & 100nm: 0.1, 1, 10 mg/L, respectively). In general, size- and concentration-dependent toxicity was pronounced with 25nm-NP and highest concentration (10mg/L) being the most toxic. Alhough a slight recovery from the TiO2 exposure was observed, significant carry-over effects were still detected. These results highlight the importance of differential size effects of metal oxide NPs on toxicity mechanisms in aquatic animals.