ABSTRACT
Fish comprise a key level in the aquatic biota and hence play a major role in industrial and municipal environmental toxicological assessments as test organisms. In Canada, the rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) 96 h acute lethality bioassay is employed to evaluate the potential hazards of chemicals, in addition to the regulation of industrial effluents by means of a standardized procedure.1 Alternative methods, such as fish cell cultures, are also gaining increasing recognition for toxicological assessments. Fish cell systems, in contrast to whole fish testing, can reduce substantially the number of fish required, improve cost efficiency and augment toxicological knowledge of complex mixtures. Several fish cell systems are now recognized that present promise for toxicological investigations.2,3 Among these are the rainbow trout gonad (RTG2) and hepatoma (RTH-149) cell lines, primary cultures of rainbow trout hepatocytes or gill epithelial cells,4 the bluefish fin (BF-2), brown bullhead catfish (BB) and goldfish scale (GFS) cell lines.5,6 These cell lines have been proposed as suitable candidates for in vitro bioassays. The use of primary cultures, such as rainbow trout hepatocytes, offers additional advantages; as that they are often a cellular target during toxic insult and are also responsible for xenobiotic biotransformation of chemicals.6
