Open AccessTesticular Toxicity Evaluation of Indium‐Tin Oxide
Author(s) -
Omura Minoru,
Tanaka Akiyo,
Hirata Miyuki,
Inoue Naohide,
Ueno Takahiro,
Homma Toshiaki,
Sekizawa Kiyohisa
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
journal of occupational health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.664
H-Index - 59
ISSN - 1348-9585
DOI - 10.1539/joh.44.105
Subject(s) - medical school , medical education , hygiene , medicine , family medicine , pathology
Indium-tin oxide (ITO) is an optically transparent conductor and is used in the making of thin-film transistor liquid crystal displays (LCDs) and photo-voltaic cells. Responding to the expanding demand for computer displays and cell phone displays, LCD production is rapidly increasing, especially in Asian countries, including Japan. Because of its superior capacity for LCDs, ITO production can also be assumed to be increasing in these countries. As far as we know, the toxicity of ITO has been poorly studied. We have reported that indium-containing semiconductor materials, indium arsenide (InAs) and indium phosphide (InP), caused lung and testicular damage in hamsters when a high dose was repeatedly administered by intratracheal instillation . As for the testicular toxicity of these two materials, indium was thought to be the toxic element. Because indium is the main component of ITO, it is possible that ITO may also have a toxic effect on the testis if the internal exposure to indium is sufficiently high. We therefore evaluated the toxicity of ITO on the testis in hamsters by using intratracheal instillations in this study.