Evaluation of safety is a prerequisite prior introduction of new chemical entities onto the market. Historically, animal testing has formed the basis for such risk assessment exercises. Driven by scientific and ethical constraints, and initiated more than 3 decades ago, however, there is a clear tendency worldwide to increasingly address animal-free methods for this purpose. This has been reinforced by a number of legislative changes over the past few years in the European Union, imposing a ban on animal testing for particular groups of chemicals. In response to this ubiquitous matter, the scientific community has been urged to develop animal-free methods for evaluating the safety of chemicals, including in vitro and in silico assays, being a research area that is gaining momentum.

This actually defines the main driver of the In2TOX Specialty Section. In2TOX involves stakeholders from different disciplines and sectors, including academia, industry and regulatory bodies. In2TOX forms a solid platform to strengthen collaboration between these stakeholders in order to achieve the overall goal, namely the advancement and promotion of in vitro and in silico methodologies in the toxicology field both scientifically and educationally. In view of maximizing crossfertilisation of expertise, In2TOX collaborates not only with other EUROTOX Speciality Sections, but equally with various relevant societies in Europe and beyond.