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Nanoparticle Research at USC
April 8, 2009
Better tasting beer, stain-repellent khakis and faster computers are among a growing list of products transformed by the application of nanoparticles - clusters of atoms and molecules so small that their physical and chemical properties are modified dramatically.
Nanoscale: 3 Examples
All dimensions are approximate. Nanoparticle
is courtesy of the
National Center for Electron
Microscopy, Lawrence Berkeley Lab,
US Department of Energy.
The particles are measured in terms of nanometers – a single nanometer representing one billionth of a meter. To put that scale in another context, the comparative size of a nanometer to a meter is the same as that of a marble to the size of the earth.
Over the past several decades, scientists have learned to use nanoparticles to imbue larger materials with different or improved properties, for example, scratch-proof glasses, stronger steel and more efficient batteries.
Researchers are working on a way to selectively tag cancer cells with gold-coated nanoparticles that can be heated by infrared radiation to kill the cancer.
Hundreds of applications using nanoparticles have been developed in recent years and the pace is accelerating with a large impact expected on job growth and career opportunities in the United States.
Within the next 10 years, the National Science Foundation (NSF) estimates that the worldwide need for nanotechnology workers will rise from the current 20,000 to two million.
All benefits to commercial products aside, USC scientists have wondered if some of these same nanomaterials also may have toxic potential?
What the experts hope to avoid is another case like DDT. An extremely potent insecticide, DDT was developed in 1939 and used worldwide until its environmental toxicity was discovered in the early 1960s.
The chemical was banned in 1972, but the toxic effects still linger in the environment around the world.
At USC, the nanoevironmental research and risk assessment effort will involve experts in a wide array of disciplines, including chemists, physicists, biologists, toxicologists, and microbial ecologists, among others. The focus of their collaborative research will be to assess the potential for nanomaterials to act as environmental toxicants, with the overall goal of improving product safety and reducing risk to society associated with nanotechnology.
