The cytotoxicity of mercury chloride to the keratinocytes is associated with metallothionein expression.

There are trace amounts of heavy metals in cosmetics. Heavy metals such as mercury (Hg), which is added to skin-whitening cosmetics, may cause acute or chronic damage to human cells. The aim of this study was to investigate the cytotoxicity of mercury chloride (HgCl2) to human keratinocytes. The keratinocytes were treated with various concentrations of HgCl2 and the cell survival fractions were found to be 38.08, 17.59, 12.76, 3.29 and 0.77% when the cells were treated with 0.25, 0.5, 0.75, 1 and 1.5 μM of HgCl2, respectively. Moreover, we observed that the greatest damage was to the cell membrane. The metallothionein (MT) protein expression was also investigated. MT expression levels increased with increasing concentrations of HgCl2. The results indicated that MT protects the keratinocytes against HgCl2-induced toxicity.