Nataliya Karyakina
Senior Toxicologist, Health Risk Analyst
Joined RSI in 2008
- DABT Certificate in general toxicology (2021-2026)
- Solid background and knowledge in medicine, epidemiology, and toxicology
- 30+ experience in hazard identification and risk assessment of chemicals
- Extensive experience in hazard-based classification of hazardous chemicals
- Significant experience in the development of health-based safety values
- Extensive experience in conducting systematic reviews
Dr. Nataliya Karyakina is a Senior Toxicologist and Health Risk Analyst at Risk Sciences International (RSI), where she has served since 2008. She plays a central role in RSI’s work at the intersection of chemical safety, regulatory science, and human health. Drawing on more than three decades of experience, Dr. Karyakina contributes to complex projects involving the evaluation and assessment of hazardous properties of chemicals with different modes of action, hazard-based classification of chemical substances under CLP (EC) 1272/2008, and the development of health-based safety values for industrial and environmental chemicals for both workers and the general population.
At RSI, Dr. Karyakina has led and co-led multidisciplinary projects addressing the health effects of essential and toxic metals (e.g., manganese, aluminum, lithium, barium, lanthanum, titanium, praseodymium), engineered nanomaterials (e.g., nanoalumina, titanium dioxide), endocrine disruptors (e.g., bisphenol A, phytoestrogens), and pharmaceuticals (e.g., statins, ethinyl estradiol, and other human and veterinary drugs). Her work also includes the application of new approach methodologies (NAMs) to hazard identification and risk assessment, identification of early molecular initiating and key events leading to carcinogenicity, and the evaluation of current clinical approaches and criteria for the diagnosis of occupational manganism.
She has been a key contributor to projects for Health Canada, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA), the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), and to international research collaborations under the REACH and CLP regulations. These efforts have included hazard and human health risk assessment projects involving recommendations for classification under CLP (EC) 1272/2008, and the derivation of Derived No-Effect Levels (DNELs) and occupational exposure guidance values.
Her systematic reviews on human health risk assessments related to exposure to talc, aluminum, manganese neurotoxicity, traditional and non-traditional biomarkers, and nanomaterials have been widely cited and used to inform international decision-making. Most of these publications were conducted in collaboration with the RSI team and international experts in their respective fields. Dr. Karyakina has also co-authored numerous publications on toxicological modeling, biomonitoring, and regulatory science in high-impact journals such as Critical Reviews in Toxicology, Neurotoxicology, Environmental Toxicology and Health, Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology, Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, and Patty’s Toxicology.
Pre-RSI
Dr. Karyakina began her career in Kyiv, Ukraine, earning a B.Sc. in Medicine and an M.Sc. in Epidemiology from Bogomolets National Medical University in 1983. She completed her Ph.D. in Toxicology in 1992 at the Ukrainian Scientific and Research Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology, where her dissertation focused on establishing environmental safety standards for novel plant growth regulators—work that foreshadowed her later expertise in environmental exposure assessment and regulatory toxicology.
She went on to serve for more than a decade as a research scientist at the L.I. Medved’s Research Center of Preventive Toxicology, Food and Chemical Safety of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine (formerly the Scientific Research Institute of Hygiene and Toxicology of Pesticides, Polymers, and Plastics, Ministry of Public Health of the USSR). There, she was responsible for:
- Assessing the toxicity of various chemical compounds in different animal species via inhalation, oral, and dermal exposure routes;
- Conducting diverse types of toxicity tests, including studies of acute and sub-acute toxicity, evaluation of cumulative properties, chronic toxicity testing, and determination of toxicity thresholds;
- Assessing and predicting toxicological parameters based on metabolic analogies, persistence, and relationships between chemical structure and physicochemical properties, as well as performing interpolation and extrapolation within homologous series;
- Studying the environmental behavior of chemicals—their persistence and migration in soil, water, and air—and analyzing the dependence of these indices on pH, temperature, and moisture content; and
- Preparing rationale documents for the development of health-based standards in various environmental media to ensure the safe use of pesticides.
In 2005, after relocating to Canada, Dr. Karyakina joined the McLaughlin Centre for Population Health Risk Assessment at the University of Ottawa. There, she contributed to numerous projects addressing the health risk assessment of endocrine-active chemicals; the potential risks associated with asbestos exposure in Canada; the main risk factors for the transmission of prion diseases in both animals and humans [Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) and variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD)]; and the psychosocial ripple effects of chemical, biological, and nuclear terrorist attacks in international contexts. This period cemented her reputation as a dedicated scientist, equally adept at quantitative risk assessment and at framing complex risk issues within their broader societal context.
Nataliya, presenting a poster during a workshop.
Case studies associated with Nataliya Karyakina
Publications associated with Nataliya Karyakina
Diagnosis of manganism and manganese neurotoxicity: A workshop report.
Review of non-invasive biomarkers as a tool for exposure characterization in human health risk assessments.
Biomarkers for occupational manganese exposure.
Magnetic resonance imaging T1 indices of the brain as biomarkers of inhaled manganese exposure.
Overview of REACH: Issues Involved in the Registration of Metals.
The REACH registration process: A case study of metallic aluminium, aluminium oxide and aluminium hydroxide.
Biomarkers of environmental manganese exposure.
Derivation of whole blood biomonitoring equivalents for lithium for the interpretation of biomonitoring data.
Derivation of whole blood biomonitoring equivalents for titanium for the interpretation of biomonitoring data.
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Outside RSI
Outside of work, Nataliya is an avid reader who embraces books as a way to experience “more than one life in more than one place,” echoing her favorite quote by Anne Tyler. She also enjoys harvesting wild mushrooms and birdwatching, activities that bring her a deep sense of connection to nature and the universe.
Dr. Karyakina is highly respected by her colleagues for her depth of professional expertise and unwavering dedication to public health protection.
