Posted by Nancy Hepp in guest commentary.
Tags: nanomaterials, nanotechnology, REACH
Vito Buonsante
Health and Environment Lawyer at ClientEarth
The smallest car in the world is one billionth of a metre. 60,000 times smaller than the thickness of a hair. And is self-propelled. Instead of carrying people or freight, it could transport molecules and atoms and be used to reconstruct damaged cells.
Nanoparticles can perform tasks that were previously never thought possible.
In recent years, nanomaterials have been increasingly used in consumer products, from sunscreens to food containers, heralded for making disinfectants that bit more effective or helping to disinfect your socks and underwear. They have even been used to clean up water contaminated with heavy metals.
But the shrinking of particles to a nanoscale can change their properties. As with many emerging technologies, we still have little understanding of the impacts these tiny particles have on our health and the environment. More and more studies are warning of the potential hazardous properties of nanoparticles. For example, nanosilver is known to wash through the sewage system into the water course and kill beneficial bacteria, which in turn disrupts ecosystems. Günter Oberdörster, a prominent expert on nanomaterials and author of the Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP) paper of the year in 2008, recently advised against any use of products containing nanomaterials in sprays, for cleaning surfaces or in self-cleaning materials.
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Posted by Nancy Hepp in Letters.
Tags: arsenic, bisphenol A, diabetes, dioxin, heavy metals, insulin resistance, organophosphorous pesticides, PCBs
Sarah Howard
Coordinator of CHE’s Diabetes-Obesity Spectrum Working Group
In a recent review, published in the leading diabetes journal Diabetologia, Hectors et al. (2011) describe how numerous environmental chemicals affect the insulin-producing beta cells of the pancreas. These effects, the authors argue, may be significant in the development of type 2 diabetes. Chemicals like bisphenol A, PCBs, dioxin, organophosphorous pesticides, arsenic, heavy metals, and others, can all affect how the beta cells function, and can interfere with their capacity to secrete insulin.
In type 2 diabetes, both insulin resistance—the body’s inability to respond correctly to insulin—and beta cell malfunction contribute to the disease. The inability of the beta cells to produce enough insulin leads to high blood glucose levels, and eventually diabetes (in many people with type 2, insulin production is higher than normal, to compensate for the insulin resistance—but it is still inadequate to bring blood glucose under control).
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Posted by Nancy Hepp in science pick.
Tags: BPA, diabetes
Sarah Howard
Coordinator of CHE’s Diabetes-Obesity Spectrum Working Group
In the past couple of months, three new analyses have asked the question: Is exposure to the widespread environmental chemical bisphenol A (BPA) associated with type 2 diabetes in humans? These three add to two previous studies on the same topic, for a grand total of five. It is a good question to ask, since laboratory evidence shows that exposure to BPA can cause insulin resistance in animals, as well as disrupt the functioning of the insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, essentially a recipe for type 2 diabetes (Alonso-Magdalena et al).
As we might expect, the new evidence does not provide a clear-cut answer to that question.
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Nanotechnology – A Threat to Our Health and the Environment? November 17, 2011
Posted by Nancy Hepp in guest commentary.Tags: nanomaterials, nanotechnology, REACH
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Vito Buonsante
Health and Environment Lawyer at ClientEarth
The smallest car in the world is one billionth of a metre. 60,000 times smaller than the thickness of a hair. And is self-propelled. Instead of carrying people or freight, it could transport molecules and atoms and be used to reconstruct damaged cells.
Nanoparticles can perform tasks that were previously never thought possible.
In recent years, nanomaterials have been increasingly used in consumer products, from sunscreens to food containers, heralded for making disinfectants that bit more effective or helping to disinfect your socks and underwear. They have even been used to clean up water contaminated with heavy metals.
But the shrinking of particles to a nanoscale can change their properties. As with many emerging technologies, we still have little understanding of the impacts these tiny particles have on our health and the environment. More and more studies are warning of the potential hazardous properties of nanoparticles. For example, nanosilver is known to wash through the sewage system into the water course and kill beneficial bacteria, which in turn disrupts ecosystems. Günter Oberdörster, a prominent expert on nanomaterials and author of the Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP) paper of the year in 2008, recently advised against any use of products containing nanomaterials in sprays, for cleaning surfaces or in self-cleaning materials.
(more…)