Plastic is unavoidable in everyday life. Many of the products we bring home are made of or packaged in plastic, all of which can release tiny and nano-sized fragments that can be accidentally consumed or inhaled. What happens when people eat, drink or inhale nearly invisible pieces of plastic without knowing it? While it's still unclear exactly how this affects humans, researchers have now taken a step toward answering that question.

Recently, the team of Zongwei Cai of Hong Kong Baptist University and Chunmiao Zheng of Southern University of Science and Technology studied for the first time the effects of 80nm nanoplastics (NPs) on mitochondrial function and metabolic pathways in normal human liver (L02) cells and lung (BEAS-2B) cells . Although nanoplastics do not cause mass cell death, nanoplastics can enter cells and cause mitochondrial damage, potentially disrupting key processes and negatively affecting organs.

This study provides, for the first time, new insights into the understanding of mitochondria-related response pathways and metabolic mechanisms in normal human cells in response to NPs exposure. The findings demonstrate that NPs can enter cells and induce mitochondrial damage without causing massive cell death. Since mitochondrial function is closely related to metabolic changes, off-target metabolomics was used to confirm that mitochondria are the most sensitive organelles to NP exposure in L02 cells and BEAS-2B cells, and reveal their metabolic mechanism for NP toxicity.

Mitochondrial damage observed in this study may contribute to cellular function and ultimately organ tissue dysfunction. Pure commercial NPs without additional chemicals were used in this study, and these NPs showed potential risks to both cell lines, suggesting previously underestimated health effects of NPs on different organs. Considering that NP pollution is complex, the actual adverse effects of NPs on the environment and human health may be greater than those measured in this study due to variations in NP shape, age, and time of coexistence with other toxic chemicals in the environment. Therefore, a better understanding of the potential adverse effects of NP exposure in humans is needed.

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