Water matters to metal nanoparticlesWhen you purchase anything from makeup to paint to sunscreen, ch
Water matters to metal nanoparticlesWhen you purchase anything from makeup to paint to sunscreen, chances are it contains engineered nanoparticles. These nanoscale materials have properties that are revolutionizing products—from medicine to agriculture to electronics. But eventually, those nanoparticles will reach natural environments. To use them safely and to their fullest potential, we need to know how they behave in real environments—and if that behavior leads to any unintended consequences.Greg Lowry, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, studies how nanoparticles behave in and impact the environment. One way researchers have studied nanoparticle fate is by tracking gold nanoparticles—because they are stable and easy to find, or so researchers thought.Recently, Lowry and Post-doctoral Researcher Astrid Avellan have made a breakthrough discovery: gold nanoparticles actually dissolve in freshwater environments, when they come into contact with mircroorganisms found on aquatic plants. During the dissolution process, gold ions are released, which will behave differently from the nanoparticles and could be toxic to some microorganisms. The study did not measure toxicity so this doesn’t mean gold nanoparticles are harmful—instead, by better understanding their behavior in biologically active environments, scientists can ultimately use this knowledge to design better nanomaterials. Their findings were published in Nature Nanotechnology. Read more. -- source link
#materials science#science#nanoparticles#environment#biomaterials#carnegie mellon