In-vitro to in-vivo extrapolations
Organisation: Helmholtz-Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, Germany
Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Beate Eschers
Hello! I am Nisa from Indonesia. My bachelor background is Environmental Engineering and Science. I decided to pursue a master degree in Environmental Contamination and Toxicology (ECT+) to learn how environmental pollutants affect the health of ecosystem and human. I attended EMJMD ECT+ in Liege University, Belgium and Universidad del Pais Vasco (UPV/EHU), Spain, where I grew further interests in bioassays to evaluate effects of contaminants to certain organisms. My brief internship in preparation of in-vitro method development using hepatic tissue of Solea solea in UPV/EHU inspired me to learn in-vitro bioassays more. I had the chance to do a master thesis with Universite de Reims and Yves Rocher to study the effects of UV filter molecules on algae and fish cell line. This experience motivated me to understand cell line and cell culture further, as well as if and how in vitro bioassay realistically reflects contaminants effects in vivo. It is a wonderful opportunity that now I am joining the QTOX network as DC5 in UFZ Helmholtz, Germany, where I will work on Quantitative In Vitro to In Vivo Extrapolation (QIVIVE). My research will predict different contaminants effects on different level organisms (algal, invertebrate, and vertebrate) from in-vitro bioassay results, mainly using RTgill-W1 fish cell line with toxicokinetics and toxicodynamics (TKTD) approach. Apart from that, we also investigate if current available method on employing fish cell line for QIVIVE can be improved.