Research Progress in Acute Oral Toxicity Testing Methods

Acute oral toxicity is the first phase of safety toxicological evaluation, with the median lethal dose (LD50) being the most commonly used assessment parameter. This paper aims to summarize and compare conventional methods for determining LD50 and alternative approaches, along with their respective advantages and disadvantages, to provide options for further toxicological studies. Alternative tests, which do not require the precise determination of LD50 values, minimize animal mortality to the greatest extent and reduce the waste of human and material resources, making them worthy of promotion. Additionally, the development of Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationship (QSAR) models for predicting in vivo acute toxicity and in vitro cell culture toxicity assays are also in progress.