Genetically modified Caenorhabditis elegans may lead to inaccurate toxicity evaluation of mixtures

Background One of the major challenges in environmental science is how to assess the toxicity and risk of complex pollutant mixtures. However, only a few studies have pointed out that there is a significant difference between the toxicities of chemicals on genetically modified strains and wild-type organisms and there are few reports of the differences in the toxicity of chemical mixtures. Therefore, six chemicals, two substituted phenols (4-chlorophenol and 4-nitrophenol), two pesticides (dichlorvos and glyphosate) and two ionic liquids (1-butylpyridinium chloride and 1-butylpyridinium bromide), were selected to construct a six-component mixture system, the lethality of various mixtures on the genetically modified Caenorhabditis elegans strain mtl - 2 ::GFP (MTL-2) at 12 and 24 h were determined, and differences in toxicity to other strains were compared. Results Although the toxicity of 4-chlorophenol on MTL-2 was not significantly different from that on N2 wild-type Caenorhabditis elegans (N2), the toxicities of the other five chemicals on MTL-2 were greater than those on N2. The toxicities of six single chemicals and nine mixture rays on MTL-2 increased with time, which is consistent with the effect on N2 and on the genetically modified strain sod - 3 ::GFP Caenorhabditis elegans (SOD-3). The toxicological interactions of various mixtures in MTL-2 at 12 h were half antagonistic (ANT) and half additive (ADD), while at 24 h, they were mainly synergistic (SYN). The toxicological interactions of various mixtures in MTL-2 change from ANT/ADD to primarily SYN with time, which is different from the change from ANT to ADD in SOD-3 and from SYN to ADD in N2. Conclusions The toxicity and toxicity interactions of chemical mixtures on different Caenorhabditis elegans strains are different. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the effect of genetic factors on the toxicological interaction of mixtures to avoid underestimating or overestimating the mixture risk.