Dear Colleagues, 

Systems-level approaches lie at the forefront of the toxicology, including our understanding of biotoxins. Such approaches are driven by the integration of classical toxicological techniques with state-of-the-art technologies (e.g., omics, in vivo visualization) in relation to the increasing complexity from biochemical, molecular, and cellular to organismal, and even population, levels. More importantly, however, systems-level toxicology has been specifically enabled by the availability of an ever-growing number of model organisms as toxicological systems, which are able to effectively target both relevant “levels” of toxicity (i.e., molecular, cellular, organismal and population) and in the context of naturally occurring biotoxins potentially provide direct relevance to plant and animal health (e.g., agriculture, veterinary medicine, aquaculture/fisheries) and ecosystems (i.e., ecotoxicology). Indeed, studies over the past half-century have seen “evolution” from bacterial and other microbial (e.g., yeast) models to a myriad of invertebrate animal (e.g., Drosphila, C. elegans, Artemia salina) and plant models (e.g., Arabidopsis, Chlamydomonas) to non-mammalian vertebrate systems (e.g., Xenopus, Zebrafish). Evolution of these model systems in relation to toxicology has, in turn, progressed hand in hand with advances in the basic science (in the same systems) of genomes and molecular biology, development, physiology, immunology, and numerous other areas that have further potentiated their utility as toxicological models.

This Special Issue invites both reviews and original research contributions related to the topic of model organisms, and the application of toxicological methodologies to these systems, toward advancement of our understanding of biotoxins from microbes, plants, and animals in relation to (1) their targets, mechanisms, and modes of action; (2) their fate including uptake, bioavailability, and metabolism; and (3) their larger relevance in areas of both human and animal health, as well as agriculture (e.g., crop plants) and ecotoxicology.

Prof. Dr. John Berry
Guest Editor

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• model organisms
• microbial toxins
• mycotoxins
• phycotoxins
• plant toxins
• systems biology
• omics
• in vivo techniques
• ecotoxicology
• agriculture