median lethal dose
Sign in to saveAlso known as LD50, LD₅₀
a measure of the lethal dose of a toxin, radiation, or pathogen required to kill half of a tested population
Research
23,031 papers- Determination of the median lethal dose of zinc gluconate in mice and safety evaluation.BMC pharmacology & toxicology · 2024
- Organoleptic assessment and median lethal dose determination of oral aldicarb in rats.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2020
- Decoding gelsenicine-induced neurotoxicity in mice via metabolomics and network toxicology.Phytomedicine : international journal of phytotherapy and phytopharmacology · 2025
- The median lethal dose (LD50) of pentothal sodium for both young and old guinea pigs and rats.Anesthesiology · 1947
- The median lethal dose and its estimation.Archives of toxicology · 1985
via PubMed
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Encyclopedic overview
In toxicology, the median lethal dose, LD50 (abbreviation for "lethal dose, 50%"), LC50 (lethal concentration, 50%) or LCt50 is a toxic unit that measures the lethal dose of a given substance. The value of LD50 for a substance is the dose required to kill half the members of a tested population after a specified test duration. LD50 figures are frequently used as a general indicator of a substance's acute toxicity. A lower LD50 is indicative of higher toxicity.
The term LD50 is generally attributed to John William Trevan. The test was created by J. W. Trevan in 1927. The term semilethal dose is occasionally used in the same sense, in particular with translations of foreign language text, but can also refer to a sublethal dose. LD50 is usually determined by tests on animals such as laboratory mice. In 2011, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved alternative methods to LD50 for testing the cosmetic drug botox without animal tests.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “median lethal dose” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.