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Reported nanosafety practices in research laboratories worldwide

Nature Nanotechnology volume 5, pages 93–96 (2010)Cite this article

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An online survey shows that most researchers do not use suitable personal and laboratory protection equipment when handling nanomaterials that could become airborne.

The possibility of nanomaterials having an adverse impact on human health and the environment has been a cause for concern for a number of years1,2,3,4,5,6,7 and various guidelines on handling nanomaterials have been published8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15. These guidelines generally recommend the use of laboratory protection equipment (such as implementation of barriers around a hazardous source to prevent its dissemination or HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air)-filtered exhaust streams), and personal protection equipment (such as suitable respirators, face shields and gloves). Here we report the results of a survey of safety practices in laboratories handling nanomaterials. We find that only about 10% of researchers who are working with nanomaterials reported using nano-enabled hoods, and one in four did not use any type of general laboratory protection. Despite knowing that the materials they made could become airborne, about 30% of researchers did not use any type of personal respiratory protection. Furthermore, many research laboratories dispose of nanomaterials in the same way they dispose of other chemicals.

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Figure 1: Awareness of regulations concerning the handling of nanomaterials.
Figure 2: Will the nanomaterials become airborne at any stage of the synthesis?

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge support from the Nanosost and Nanotrap projects funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN), Spain. M.A. also acknowledges support from the Ramón y Cajal program.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Nanoscience Institute of Aragon (INA), Pedro Cerbuna 12, University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, 50009, Spain

    Francisco Balas, Manuel Arruebo, Jone Urrutia & Jesus Santamaria

  2. Networking Biomedical Research Center of Bioengineering, Biomaterials and Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN), Maria de Luna 11, Zaragoza, 50018, Spain

    Francisco Balas, Manuel Arruebo & Jesus Santamaria

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  1. Francisco Balas
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  2. Manuel Arruebo
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  3. Jone Urrutia
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Correspondence to Jesus Santamaria.

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Balas, F., Arruebo, M., Urrutia, J. et al. Reported nanosafety practices in research laboratories worldwide. Nature Nanotech 5, 93–96 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2010.1

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