Risk Assessment of Nanoparticles
Nanotechnology is expected to be the basis of many of the main technological innovations of the 21st century. Research and development in this field is growing rapidly throughout the world. A major output of this activity is the development of new materials in the nanometre scale, including nanoparticles. These are usually defined as particulate materials with at least one dimension of less than 100 nanometres (nm). One nanometre is 10-9 m. By comparison, a human hair is approximately 70,000 nm in diameter, a red blood cell is approximately 5,000 nm wide and simple organic molecules have sizes ranging from 0.5 to 5 nm
Carbon nanotubes
Epithelial cell with intracellular nanoparticles
Nanoparticles include carbon nanotubes, metal nanowires, semiconductor quantum dots and other nanoparticles produced from a huge variety of substances. Responsible development of any new materials requires that risks to health and the general environment associated with the development, production, use and disposal of these materials are addressed. This is necessary to protect workers involved in production and use of these materials, the public and the ecosystem. However, it also helps inform the public debate about the development of these new, potentially beneficial, materials.
Assessment of health risks arising from exposure to chemicals or other substances, requires understanding of the intrinsic toxicity of the substance, the levels of exposure (by inhalation, by ingestion or through the skin) that may occur and any relationship between exposure and health effects. Concerns about the lack of knowledge and possible risks arising from exposure to nanoparticles led the UK Government to request advice from the Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineering and to the formation of their Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Working Group. Their report, published in July 2004 (http://www.nanotec.org.uk), makes wide ranging recommendations about the need for more and better information and for a coherent approach to these concerns.
The IOM has unique and extensive experience concerning the potential risks from particles and fibres. Our approach combines expertise and state-of-art techniques to identify and characterise exposure scenarios, conduct toxicity evaluations and undertake risk assessments to identify, characterise and estimate the relative safety of nanoparticles. This approach allows us to extend current knowledge and facilitate comparisons between existing substances and new nanoparticles.
IOM nanoparticle activities and initiatives:
The Safety of Nano-materials Interdisciplinary Research Centre (SnIRC) Initiative
- IOM has formed a multidisciplinary consortium of internationally recognised researchers with unique and extensive experience to address nanoparticle risk issues. The SnIRC initiative is based on a long-standing collaboration between the IOM and the Universities of Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Napier. Members of the group include Dr Rob Aitken (IOM), Prof Ken Donaldson (Edinburgh), Prof Jon Ayres (Aberdeen), Prof Vicki Stone (Napier) and Dr Lang Tran (IOM). The group is chaired by Prof Anthony Seaton (IOM). More information about SnIRC can be found at www.snirc.org
Current and recent IOM work
- EMERGNANO: A review of completed and near completed environment, health and safety research on nanomaterials and nanotechnology Defra Project CB0409 (TM/09/01), downloadable from http://www.iom-world.org/pubs/IOM_TM0901.pdf
- The ENRHES project was an EU FP7 project which performed a comprehensive and critical scientific review of the health and environmental safety of fullerenes, carbon nanotubes (CNTs), metal and metal oxide nanomaterials. The review considers sources, pathways of exposure, the health and environmental outcomes of concern, in the context illustrating the state-of-the-art in the field and informing the regulation of the potential risks of engineered nanoparticles.
Aitken RJ, Aschberger K, Baun A, Christensen F, Fernandes T, Foss Hansen S, Hankin SM, Hartmann NB, Hutchison G, Johnston H, Micheletti C, Peters SAK, Ross BL, Solkull-Kluettgen B, Stark D, Stone V &Tran L (2009) Engineered Nanoparticles: Review of Health and Environmental Safety (ENRHES), Report on EC FP7 CSA #218433. Report downloadable from:
http://nmi.jrc.ec.europa.eu/documents/pdf/ENRHES%20Review.pdf
- PARTICLE_RISK was a collaborative research project funded by the European Commission FP6-NEST programme. It involved 7 research organisations throughout Europe and is led by IOM (Project leader Lang Tran). The aim of PARTICLE_RISK Project was to acquire a bank of NESTP (Fullerene C60, Carbon Nanotubes, Carbon Black, CdTe Quantum dot and nano sized gold) and to assess the health risk from exposure to these materials through air or the food supply with a work programme, integrating in vitro experiments, animal models of healthy/susceptible individuals and exposure/risk assessment. PARTICLE_RISK was completed in 2008.
- Tran CL, Hankin SM, Ross B, Aitken RJ, Jones AD, Donaldson K, Stone V, Tantra R (2008). An outline scoping study to determine whether high aspect ratio nanoparticles (HARN) should raise the same concerns as do asbestos fibres. (Defra project CB0406), downloadable from http://www.safenano.org/Uploads/HARN.pdf
- Hankin SM, Tran CL, Ross B, Donaldson K, Stone V, Chaudhry Q (2008).CELL PEN. A study to identify the physico-chemical factors controlling the capacity of nanoparticles to penetrate cells. ( Defra project CB0407) downloadable from http://www.safenano.org/Admin/Uploads/CellPenCB0407.pdf