Effects of corexit oil dispersants and the WAF of dispersed oil on DNA damage and repair in cultured human bronchial airway cells, BEAS-2B

Large quantities of dispersants were used as a method to disperse the roughly 210 million gallons of spilled crude oil that consumed the Gulf of Mexico. Little is known if the oil-dispersant and oil-dispersant mixtures on human airway BEAS-2B epithelial cells. Here we present the cytotoxic and genotoxic in vitro effects on the human lung cells BEAS-2B following exposure to and oil-dispersant mixtures on human airway BEAS-2B epithelial cells. Here we present the cytotoxic and genotoxic in vitro effects on the human lung cells BEAS-2B following exposure to Corexit dispersants EC9500 and EC9527, Water Accommodated Fraction (WAF) -crude, WAF-9500 + Oil, and WAF-9527 + Oil. Cellular cytotoxicity to WAF-dispersed oil samples was observed at concentrations greater than 1000 ppm with over 70% of observed cellular death. At low concentration exposures (100 and 300 ppm) DNA damage was evidenced by the detection of single strand breaks (SSBs) and double strand breaks (DSBs) as measured by alkaline and neutral comet assay analyses. Immunoblot analyses of the phosphorylated histone H2A.X (ɣ-H2A.X) and tumor suppressor p53 protein confirmed activation of the DNA damage response due to the exposure-induced DNA breaks. Although, many xenobiotics interfere with DNA repair pathways, in vitro evaluation of the nucleotide excision repair (NER) and DSB repair pathways appear to be unaffected by the oil-dispersant mixtures tested. Overall, this study supports that oil-dispersant mixtures induce genotoxic effects in culture.