Generation of toxic degradation products by sonication of Pluronic® dispersants: implications for nanotoxicity testing

Poloxamers (known by the trade name Pluronic (R)) are triblock copolymer surfactants that contain two polyethylene glycol blocks and one polypropylene glycol block of various sizes. Poloxamers are widely used as nanoparticle dispersants for nanotoxicity studies wherein nanoparticles are sonicated with a dispersant to prepare suspensions. It is known that poloxamers can be degraded during sonication and that reactive oxygen species contribute to the degradation process. However, the possibility that poloxamer degradation products are toxic to mammalian cells has not been well studied. We report here that aqueous solutions of poloxamer 188 (Pluronic (R) F-68) and poloxamer 407 (Pluronic (R) F-127) sonicated in the presence or absence of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) can became highly toxic to cultured cells. Moreover, toxicity correlated with the sonolytic degradation of the polymers. These findings suggest that caution should be used in interpreting the results of nanotoxicity studies where the potential sonolytic degradation of dispersants was not controlled.