Great need for a little inspection

Authorities must act quickly to assess the health dangers inherent in nanotechnology

Ten years ago, the biggest fear about nanotechnology was that it could practically destroy the planet. In his article "Why the Future Doesn't Need Us", Bill Joy, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, warned that self-organizing nano-robots could get out of our control. Such sub-robots, with sensing capabilities, that were not properly programmed, could replicate themselves endlessly and spread and cover the landscape in a gray mass of destruction that would destroy the Earth and consume any creature lucky enough to call it home.

Today we can only hope that our current scenarios, which cut the earth's judgment to the core, will be so far-fetched. Our existential concerns revolve around much more immediate problems, such as global warming and disease. Nanotechnology, combined with improved solar panels, wind turbines or mechanisms for releasing drugs in the body, may turn out to be an important tool for fighting these threats.
And yet, like any new technology, nanomaterials bring with them both a promise for good and a threat for bad. The most prominent concerns are not about the holocaust of the gray pulp but about the more likely and boring possibility that some of these new materials will turn out to be hazardous to health or the environment. Ordinary materials discover new properties at the nanoscale, and nanoscale grains of seemingly mild materials can turn out to be harmful. Even natural nanoparticles can harm the human body, and if natural materials are dangerous, we must be doubly careful, and carefully examine the effect of engineered nanomaterials. The size of nanoparticles allows them to leak very easily into the environment and penetrate deep into internal organs such as the lungs and liver. Another concern stems from the fact that each nano-material is one of a kind. Therefore, even though researchers have conducted several tests to examine the health hazards posed by certain materials, this sampling approach does not provide a broad picture of the dangers. Quantitative data are needed to show which substances and which concentrations affect the body and in what time frames.
In response to this uncertainty, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a broad research strategy to examine the health and environmental effects of nanomaterials. This is a welcome step, which many have been recommending for years. We hope that this program will help in building an established database that will provide policy makers and the public with the facts needed to understand the possible dangers posed by certain nanomaterials. And although it is not wise to rush an in-depth study, speed is more important than anything else. A project examining new nanotechnologies found that there are more than 1,000 products that include nanomaterials for sale in the US today, and the number is rising rapidly.

We emphasize the speed due to the terrible reputation that the EPA acquired for itself in a similar study that it conducted in recent years. The American Congress ordered the agency in 1996 to conduct a comprehensive survey on the damage caused to the environment by substances that disrupt the endocrine system (endocrine disruptors). These substances disrupt the body's hormonal system and may cause abnormal development of genitals, infertility and cancer. Although the US has banned the production of some substances known to be harmful, such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and DDT, there is concern that other common substances, most notably bisphenol-A and some pesticides, may also be harmful. to the endocrine system in the body.

The EPA's response to the congressional directive has been excruciatingly slow, even by the standards of a government agency. Instead of quickly beginning to investigate the thousands of substances suspected of being endocrine disruptors that may be found in US drinking water, the EPA spent the next ten years building a maze of committees and subcommittees designed to assess which substances are worth testing and which methods should be employed to do so. By 2002, 6 years after the program began, the EPA was able to present little more than the process it intended to employ to select the 50 to 100 substances that would eventually undergo review. In 2007, the agency published the draft list of these substances, and in April 2009 it finished preparing the list. It wasn't until October 2009, 13 years after the program began, that the agency solemnly announced it was beginning to investigate.

The United States cannot afford a repetition of this farce, and not only because of the concern for public health. At a time when so many nano-materials are already on the market, and when public awareness of nanotechnology is so low, one case of safety panic is enough to convince consumers that nanotechnology as a whole is a dangerous thing. (See Europe's attitude toward genetic modification as an example of how an entire culture turns against an entire type of innovation.) Additionally, without scientific guidance and clear regulations, many commercial companies are hesitant to invest in nanotechnology R&D because they fear future lawsuits should one day be found out. that the technology they used would be seen as dangerous. The Procter & Gamble Corporation, for example, does not operate in the field of nanotechnology for fear of lawsuits in the distant future.

This uncertainty endangers people's health and stifles innovation. And considering all the dangers lurking in our world, we need every shred of innovation.

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