Nanotube found as risky as asbestos
Material is used in variety of goods
WASHINGTON - Microscopic, high-tech "nanotubes" being manufactured for use in a wide variety of consumer products cause the same kind of damage in the body as asbestos does, according to a study in mice that is raising alarms among workplace safety experts and others.
Within days of being injected into mice, the nanotubes - which are increasingly used in electronic components, sporting goods, and dozens of other products - triggered a kind of cellular reaction that over a period of years typically leads to mesothelioma, a fatal form of cancer, according to researchers.
Only certain kinds of the vanishingly small fibers have that toxic effect, the study found.
And further experiments must be done to prove that the engineered motes can cause problems when inhaled, the way that most people might possibly be exposed to them.
But the preliminary evidence of cancer risk is strong enough to justify urgent follow-up tests and government guidance for nano factory workers, who are most likely to be exposed, specialists said.
Others called for labels to guide consumers or recyclers who might encounter the material when incinerating or otherwise destroying discarded nano products.
"In a sense we are forewarned and forearmed now with respect to nanotubes," said Anthony Seaton of the Institute of Occupational Medicine in Edinburgh, who contributed to the research, published in yesterday's online edition of the journal Nature Nanotechnology.
