Traditional Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationships (QSAR) models based on molecular descriptors as translators of chemical information show some drawbacks in predicting toxicity of nanomaterials due to their unique properties and to their nonhomogeneous structure.This chapter provides instructions on how to use CORAL, freely available software for building nano-QSAR models. CORAL makes use of descriptors based on "quasi-SMILES" representing physicochemical features and/or experimental conditions as an alternative to traditional SMILES encoding chemical structure to build up predictive nano-QSAR models for cytotoxicity.
Keywords: CORAL; Cell viability; Nano-QSAR; Nanoparticles; Quasi-SMILES.