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Nanotubes May Pose Great Health Risk

Posted on: Wednesday, 21 May 2008, 09:00 CDT

Microscopic, high-tech "nanotubes" that are being made for use in a wide variety of consumer products cause the same kind of damage in the body as asbestos does, according to a study in mice that is raising alarms among workplace safety experts and others.

Within days of being injected into mice, the nanotubes - which are increasingly used in electronic components, sporting goods and other products - triggered a kind of cellular reaction that over a period of years typically leads to mesothelioma, a fatal form of cancer, researchers said.

Only longer versions of the vanishingly small fibers have that effect, the study found. And more tests must be done to prove they can cause problems when inhaled, the way most people might be exposed to them.

But the preliminary evidence of cancer risk is strong enough to justify urgent follow-up tests and government guidance for nano factory workers, who are most likely to be exposed, experts said. Others called for labels to guide consumers or recyclers who might encounter the material when destroying discarded nano products.

"In a sense, we are forewarned and forearmed now ," said Anthony Seaton of the Institute of Occupational Medicine in Edinburgh, Scotland, who contributed to the research, published in Tuesday's online edition of the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

The research comes at a crucial time in the science, business and regulation of nanotechnology, a promising new field that involves the creation of particles a few billionths of a meter in diameter.

Such minuscule bits of material behave very differently from larger pieces of the same substances. So while some kinds of carbon in chunk form do not conduct electricity well, for example, nanotubes made of carbon atoms conduct it easily, making them useful in computer components and other materials that would be harmed by a buildup of static charges.

Companies around the world have begun to churn out thousands of tons of nanomaterials per year, including nanotubes and other engineered specks called quantum dots, which show promise in medical diagnosis. Nanotubes alone are expected to be a $2 billion industry within the next few years.

But that production frenzy has raised concerns because the materials are being regulated on the basis of what they are made of - such as "carbon" - although, by virtue of their size, some pose very different health and environmental risks.

The study, led by Ken Donaldson of the MRC/University of Edinburgh Centre for Inflammation Research, tracked the short-term effects of various kinds of carbon nanotubes and asbestos fibers injected into the mesothelium, tissues surrounding the lungs and other organs. That is where certain kinds of asbestos fibers tend to migrate after being inhaled . Longer nanotubes caused granulomas, early cellular changes that can lead to cancer.

finding

Days after microscopic, high-tech nanotubes were injected into mice, a cellular reaction that typically leads to a form of cancer over a period of years occurred.

Source: Virginian - Pilot

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