Comet assay in neural cells as a tool to monitor DNA damage induced by chemical or physical factors relevant to environmental and occupational exposure

Biomonitoring of the effects of environmental and occupational exposure relevant chemical or physical factors on central nervous system is difficult due to the problems with sampling of biological material. Thus, surrogate systems allowing for the estimation of effect intensity are necessary to evaluate a potential risk of exposure. Cancerous neural cells in culture seem to be a reliable trustworthy alternative to ex vivo primary cells culture, where brain tissue is hardly available. In this review we summarized attempts to test genotoxicity of environmentally related xenobiotics or physical factors. Different neural cells of human and non-human origin are described in respect to their use in genotoxicity testing using the comet assay. Surprisingly, despite the large number of commercially available neural cells of different type and origin, only twelve were used for genotoxicity testing by the comet assay. We also recapitulate the environmentally relevant chemical and physical factors tested on neural cell lines in vitro by the comet assay. The most prevalent were fire retardants, plant protection agents, nanoparticles and magnetic field.