oEPA
United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
www.epa.gov/comptox

Chemical Toxicity Databases
(AS. EPA'S PUBLICALLY AVAILABLE
CHEMICAL TOXICITY DATABASES
Tens of thousands of chemicals
are currently in commerce, and
hundreds more are introduced every
year. Because current chemical
testing is expensive and time
consuming, only a small fraction
of chemicals have been assessed
adequately for potential risk.
The U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency is working to change the
current approach to chemical
toxicity risk assessment through
its Computational Toxicology
Research Program (CompTox).
The program uses innovative
research that integrates advances
in molecular biology, chemistry,
and computer science to more
effectively and efficiently rank
chemicals based on potential risks.
Other chemical testing processes
are time consuming and can cost
millions of dollars. Using CompTox
methods and tools, a large number
of chemicals can be screened for
risks at a small cost in a very short
amount of time.
CompTox has a package of
decision-support tools that help
guide chemical information, risk,
hazard and exposure. Many
of these tools are publically
available. ACToR (Aggregated
Computational Toxicology Resource)
data warehouse is one of these
tools that is available online at
www.epa.gov/actor.
ACToR is made up of 500 public data
sources on over 500,000 chemicals
and it provides information on
chemical exposure, hazard and
potential risks to human health and
the environment.
It can be used to query a specific
chemical and find all available
public hazard, exposure and
Too Many Chemicals
10000
1000
100
10
1
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
risk assessment data as well as
previously unpublished studies
related to cancer, reproductive and
developmental toxicity.
ACToR links to a chemical toxicity
reference database called ToxRefDB
(http://actor.epa.gov/toxrefdb) which
allows scientists and the interested
public to search and download
thousands of animal toxicity testing
results on hundreds of chemicals.
The database captures 30 years
and $2 billion worth of animal
testing that was previously found
only in paper documents. ToxRefDB
provides detailed chemical toxicity
data in a publically accessible
searchable format.
ToxRefDB contains animal toxicity
information that when combined
with other sources of information,
such as exposure and metabolism,
form the basis for pesticide risk
assessments.
ACToR also
links to DSSTox.
DSSTox
provides a
public forum
for publishing
downloadable,
structure-searchable, standardized
chemical structure files associated
with toxicity data developed from
available structure-viewing freeware
and open-source programming
tools. It delivers a simple, easy-to-
use structure-searching capability
through the chemical inventory
of published DSSTox Data Files.
The DSSTox Structure-Browser
application can be accessed directly
from the DSSTox webpage.
Using ACToR scientists and
others who are interested can
also access data resulting from
another EPA chemical screening
tool called ToxCast™. ToxCast™
is a multi-year, multi-million dollar
effort that uses advanced science
tools to help efficiently understand
biological processes impacted by
chemicals that may lead to adverse
health effects.
ToxCast™ currently includes 500
fast, automated chemical screening
tests that are assessing your
environmental chemicals. ACToR
allows users to take advantage of
this linkage to find and download
these results.
Collaboration
Opportunities
The CompTox Research Program
partners and collaborates with
9912
In
~	IRIS ¦ TRI	¦ Pesticides
~	Inerts ~ CCL 1 & 2 ~ HPV
¦ MPV
Too Little Data (%)
IS
~	Acute ¦ Cancer ¦ Gentox
~	DevTox DReproTox

CH-
HO
CH-
0
Office of Research and Development

-------
Chemical Toxicity Databases
EPA regions and program
offices, industry, academia, trade
associations, other federal agencies,
state and local government agencies
and non-governmental organizations
with an interest in revolutionizing
the current approach to assessing
chemical toxicity risk to humans
and the environment. Collaboration
opportunities include a Communities
of Practice group and different
types of agreements that facilitate
the sharing of research data
and studies.
The CompTox program goal is to
provide fast, automated tests for
screening and assessing chemical
exposure, hazard and risk. Housed
within EPA's Office of Research
and Development, CompTox is
composed of three main elements.
The largest component is the
National Center for Computational
Toxicology (NCCT), which was
established in 2005 to coordinate
research on chemical screening
and prioritization, informatics and
systems modeling.
The second element consists of
research in EPA's National Health
and Environmental Effects Research
Laboratory (NHEERL) and National
Exposure Research Laboratory
(NERL). The final components are
the academic centers working on
various aspects of computational
toxicology funded by EPA's Science
to Achieve Results (STAR) program.
Other CompTox decision support
tools and research projects include
ExpoCast, Virtual Liver, Virtual
Embryo, ToxPi and Tox21.
For more information:
www.epa.gov/comptox
www.epa.gov/actor
www.epa.gov/ncct/dsstox
Contact:
National Center for
Computational Toxicology
Robert Kavlock
Director
kavlock.robert@epa.gov
David Dix
Deputy Director
dix.david@epa.gov
Monica Linnenbrink
Public Affairs Specialist
linnenbrink.monica@epa.gov
Main Office: 919-541-4219
www.epa.gov/comptox
109 T.W. Alexander Drive (B-205-01)
Research Triangle Park, NC 27711
Recycled/Recyclable
Printed on paper that contains a minimum
of 50% postconsumer fiber content
processed chlorine free
Office of Research and Development

-------