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Biological (Mechanistic) Research
Advancing Biological (Mechanistic) Research
EPA's Human Health Research Program is advancing understanding of how a substance causes an effect at the most basic chemical and biological levels. The goal of biological research is to address uncertainties in the risk assessment process by conducting mode of action (MOA) research on several chemical classes of interest to risk assessors. These chemicals include conazole pesticides, neuroendocrine-related pesticides, arsenic and related chemicals, air pollutants and other chemicals that may act by increasing oxidative stress, and brominated drinking water contaminants.
Biological research is identifying key biological events that may be common for chemicals in each representative chemical class. Once MOA information is obtained using emerging molecular methods or with in vitro techniques, research will be done to determine if those changes can be extrapolated to in vivo models and humans.
Goals
- Identify key biological events for representative MOAs that can be used to reduce uncertainty in extrapolation in risk assessment, i.e., high-to-low dose, from animals-to- humans, and from in vitro- to in vivo exposures.
- Determine if there is a common MOA for chemicals of the same class that could be used for risk assessment.
- Provide MOA at the low end of the dose-response curve for representative chemicals and MOAs to help inform the choice of risk assessment methodology.
- Develop comparable approaches for the use of MOA information in cancer and non-cancer risk assessments.
- Identify methods and models that could be used to determine MOA information for chemicals or classes of chemicals.
- Provide MOA data that can be used to refine and replace current testing approaches for environmental agents.