According to Lux Research, a consultancy of emerging technologies, nanotechnology has the potential to generate a $2.6 trillion market by 2014.  However, the nanoparticles – the ultrafine particles in the scale of one billionth of a meter that have been used in various products – could pose a serious risk to lungs, as a recent study by Chinese toxicologists suggests.

The study, led by Dr. Yuguo Song of the Occupational Disease and Clinical Toxicology Department at Chaoyang Hospital in Beijing, was published in August in the European Respiratory Journal, the official publication of the European Respiratory Society.

Seven young female Chinese who had worked in a print plant for between five and thirteen months went to Chaoyang Hospital, seeking treatment for respiratory problems, accompanied by itchy eruptions of the skin on the face and arms.  Within two years, two of them died and a third developed severe, irreversible damage to her lungs.

The liquid effusion around the lungs of the deceased and surviving patient was found to contain nanoparticles with a diameter of approximately 30 nanometers.  Along with an examination of the female’s working environment where paint with nanoparticles added was used, Song and his colleagues concluded that the women’s illness was caused by the inherent toxicity of the nanoparticles, which entered the body either through the airways or through the skin, or perhaps through both.

The finding, if verified, will have significant implications for the development of nanotechnology.  This explains why the topic got attention during ChinaNano 2009, which was held early September in Beijing.

After a presentation by Professor Andre Nel of the University of California Los Angeles Medical School, I asked him to comment on Song’s paper and the possible deaths caused by nanoparticles.  Nel seemed to disagree with the conclusion of the paper, indicating that the cause of the deaths most likely was not nanoparticles, but other materials in the working environment, such as smoke.
 
During the same conference, Professor Mauro Ferrari of the University of Texas Houston Health Science Center made a similar point by saying that Song’s research is probably “incomplete and methodologically flawed.”  In particular, he mentioned that there was no physical or chemical evidence to link the deaths to the so-called nanoparticles and that the high-density organic smoke was very much suspect.
 
Dr. Yuliang Zhao, a leading Chinese nano safety expert of the Institute of High-Energy Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Center for Nano Science and Technology’s Lab of Nano Biological Effect and Safety, indicated that further research is needed to determine whether the particles inhaled by the workers were at the nano scale.

According to Zhao, Song’s paper did not include data indicating the source of the particles.  Zhao also did not believe that nanoparticles were able to penetrate into workers’ bodies through the skin, as Song claimed.

Zhao told me that Song had once approached him for collaboration on the research.  But Zhao wanted to inspect the factory, to collect samples onsite himself, and to interview the workers, which Song did not grant.  They ended up not working together.
 
As Song calls on scientists throughout the world to “work together and address this new challenge” in his European Respiratory Journal paper, it is said that a team of European and American scientists plan to conduct fieldwork in the Chinese factory for further investigation.  Until then, at least, nanoparticles have to be handled with care.