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[BorkBork]

I always hear in the news about the potential for nanoparticles, so this naturally threw me for a loop when I saw it in the paper today. Thought I would share this with GAF:

http://www.straight.com/article-404589/vancouver/tiny-nanoparticles-could-be-big-problem?page=0%2C1

In the journal Cancer Research in 2009, environmental-health professor Robert Schiestl coauthored the first comprehensive study of how titanium-dioxide nanoparticles affect the genes of live animals. Mice in his study suffered DNA and chromosomal damage after drinking water with the nanoparticles for five days.

When inhaled, some types of nanoparticles have been shown to act like asbestos, inflaming lung tissue and leading to cancer. In 2009, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Cancer Research declared titanium dioxide to be “possibly carcinogenic to humans” after studies found that inhaling it in nanoparticle form caused rats to develop lung cancer and mice to suffer organ damage.

Nanoparticles can also hurt the skin. All those nanoparticles in skin creams and sunscreens may be behind a rise in eczema rates in the developed world, according to a 2009 study in the journal Experimental Biology and Medicine. The study found that titanium-dioxide nanoparticles caused mice to develop eczema. The nanoparticles “can play a significant role in the initiation and/or progression of skin diseases”, the study said.

The disconcerting thing is that this stuff is pretty much everywhere now. I need to do more research on this, but I'm always reminded of the double-edged sword of technology. This is another potential example.

 

[spats]

It seems a bit worrisome. I read about that sunscreen thing a while ago. Apparently they use nanoparticles so that they could make it transparent. Why screw around with stuff like that when you're not sure what it's going to cause to humans and animals?

Really, fuck technology and fuck religion. The only thing I can count on nowdays are my survival skills. Better start drinking my own piss and living in a cave.

 

[GavinGT]

 

[BorkBork]

It seems a bit worrisome. I read about that sunscreen thing a while ago. Apparently they use nanoparticles so that they could make it transparent. Why screw around with stuff like that when you're not sure what it's going to cause to humans and animals?

I think it stems from a very well meaning effort to make things BETTER. But to light a candle is a create a shadow; there's always something unaccounted for and unexpected when you do something new. What always seems to be lacking is the proper questioning and discussion before going ahead.

 

[BorkBork]

This was the accompanying article, regarding incinerators and nanoparticles

http://www.straight.com/article-405110/vancouver/metro-vancouvers-proposed-incinerator-might-have-nanopollution-problem

Incinerators come equipped with filters to catch emissions, but these are generally designed to capture mostly large particles, said Vyvyan Howard, a nanoparticle expert and professor of bioimaging at the University of Ulster, in a phone interview from his office in Coleraine, Northern Ireland.

The filters typically let through five to 30 percent of smaller particles under 2.5 microns (millionths of a metre) in size, which cause the worst health damage, Howard noted in a 2009 report on a proposed incinerator in Cork, Ireland.

As for the smallest, nano-sized particles, today’s incinerator filters allow the majority of them to pass through and into the air, Howard wrote.

Europeans lose an average of eight months of life expectancy due to fine-particle pollution of 2.5 microns in size, which leads to the equivalent of 3.6 million life-years lost each year, according to a 2005 report by the European Commission.

Nanoparticles are even more toxic than fine particles. That’s partly because they have far more surface area that can react with body tissues than bigger particles of the same weight. (For example, a cubic metre block of wood split into 10,000 splinters will offer up far more surface area than the original block.)