Nanoparticles from vehicle exhaust and industrial emissions are entering people’s lungs, noses, and even nerve cells, yet regulators lack the data to say what levels are safe. This matters because nanoparticles—particles smaller than one hundred millionth of a metre—are increasingly common in manufacturing and pollution, but current risk assessments rely on chemical data that do not apply to them. The UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has set priority objectives for nanoparticle safety, and this project will address nearly three-quarters of them. The researchers will measure real-world nanoparticle levels outdoors, indoors, and in personal exposure, then use those realistic concentrations—not the artificially high ones typical in lab studies—to test how three metals from vehicle exhaust (cerium, zinc, and vanadium) enter lung and nasal cells, move inside them, and trigger molecular changes such as inflammation. They will also examine cells from asthma patients, who may be more vulnerable. If this work succeeds, it will provide the first evidence-based foundation for setting safe exposure limits for nanoparticles. Regulators at the Health and Safety Executive and Defra will use the findings to guide the safe development and use of nanomaterials in consumer goods, manufacturing, and pollution control—systems that currently operate without clear safety thresholds.
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Lay summary Nanoparticles (NPs - very small particles less than 1 hundred millionth of a meter in size) are increasingly being used in the manufacture of a wide range of goods and for other beneficial uses. They are also found in vehicle and industrial emissions and yet we know little about their capability to harm health. Although there are ways to achieve a risk assessment for chemicals in the environment based on the levels that exist and their known biological effects, there is insufficient information available to allow a risk assessment of NPs. This work will address almost three quarters of the priority objectives recently set by Defra in relation to NPs and human and environmental health and thus will make a major step-change in the assessment of risks from NPs. To do this requires the collaboration of scientists with different types of skills and knowledge (ranging from chemistry, physics, molecular and cellular biology, toxicology, exposure measurement, materials science and health/medicine ) to join forces in an approach to understand the extent of human exposures to NPs and how they affect the body. In this project, we will measure levels of NPs outdoors in urban and rural locations, indoors and also personal levels of exposure. We will concentrate on 3 metals (cerium, zinc and vanadium) as these are found in vehicle exhaust. We will use these real life levels (rather than the usual approach of using high concentrations) in a series of lab experiments to define where these NPs go once breathed in and what damage they might do. We will work out how these metal NPs (which have different shapes, sizes and chemical make up) find their way into cells in laboratory tests. We will also work out in cells from the human lung and the inside of the nose in the laboratory how these NPs move once they have got inside these cells. As asthmatic subjects may be more susceptible to these effects we will also look at cells from asthma patients. NPs are able to get inside nerve cells and as this may allow them to get to the brain, we will also look at how this possible route of entry. Once NPs have entered cells they are in a position to cause harm and we will study, using state of the art technology, which molecules are stimulated to appear once these NPs have entered the cells. This will tell us what sorts of processes might occur (e.g. inflammation) and consequently will allow us to establish possible 'safe' levels of exposure. We will then be able to advise on the safe development and use of NPs through interaction with the Health and Safety Executive and the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) who are responsible for the regulation of NPs in the UK.
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