PARENT SESSION

2A - Mixture toxicity
Poster Hall
8:30 AM - Monday, 28 April 2003
Chair: Hermens, J.¹, ¹
Co-chair: Toy, R.², Backhaus, T.³, ^{2 3}

(MOP/67) Use of Two-level Factorial Experiments in Studying the Toxicity of Metal Mixtures.

Ren, Shijin^{1, 2}, Mee, Robert², Frymier, Paul^{1, 3}, ¹ University of Tennessee Center for Environmental Biotechnology, Knoxville, Tennessee, USA² University of Tennessee Department of Statistics, Knoxville, Tennessee, USA³ University of Tennessee Department of Chemical Engineering, Knoxville, Tennessee, USA

ABSTRACT- There are several limitations in the current methods of assessing the toxicity of metal mixtures such as relying on the assumption that the effects of the toxicants in a mixture is additive. In addition, conclusions are frequently not extendable to other experimental conditions as a result of the way the experiments were conducted. An approach based on two-level factorial experiments was taken in this study for understanding and predicting the toxicity of binary and ternary metal mixtures. Models were fit to the experimental data and predictions based on the models were compared with observed toxicity for binary and ternary metal mixtures. The models we developed did not assume additivity between metals, were simple and interpretable, and gave satisfactory predictions of the toxicity of metal mixtures.

Key words: Metal mixtures, Toxicity, Factorial experiments