Nano and Other Emerging Chemical Technologies Blog

On September 26, 2023, Nano4EARTH will hold a roundtable discussion on batteries and energy storage. The roundtable will aim to identify fundamental knowledge gaps, needs, and opportunities to advance current electrification goals. According to the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI), by convening stakeholders from different sectors, backgrounds, and expertise, the roundtable is intended to identify applicable lessons across the spectrum of technologies and to discuss...

On September 12-13, 2023, the “2023 Workshop on Nanotechnology Infrastructure of the Future” will be held in Washington, D.C., and online. Since the current National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure (NNCI) award cycle ends in 2025, the conference organizers are looking ahead to the future and the next national resource in science and technology infrastructure. Shared facilities, such as those historically supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), provide...

On August 14, 2023, the United Kingdom’s (UK) Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS) called for the submission of any scientific information relevant to the safety assessment of nanomaterials used in cosmetics. Article 16 of the UK Cosmetics Regulation requires that cosmetic products containing nanomaterials be notified to the Secretary of State at least six months prior to being placed on the market. These notifications may be completed via the Submit Cosmetic Product Notification...

On August 2, 2023, the European Union (EU) Observatory for Nanomaterials (EUON) announced that it published a study that systematically reviews and assesses alternative methods for the testing of the safety of nanomaterials without the use of animals. According to EUON, the main aim of the study was to collect and provide accurate and transparent information on new approach methodologies (NAM) available for the human safety assessment of nanomaterials and to create a comprehensive...

On June 26, 2023, the European Commission’s (EC) Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS) published the second revision of its Guidance on the Safety Assessment of Nanomaterials in Cosmetics. The Guidance covers the main elements of safety assessment, i.e., general considerations (Section 2), material characterization (Section 3), exposure assessment (Section 4), hazard identification and dose-response characterization (Section 5), and risk assessment (Section 6). SCCS states...

On July 31, 2023, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it provided more than $1.3 million in funding to a team of researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison to develop nanosensor technology that can detect, monitor, and degrade commonly used pesticides found in water that can harm human health. According to EPA, using funding from the grant, researchers will develop an integrated, portable, sensor-controlled water treatment technology that itself...

On September 20, 2023, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) will hold a webinar on Test Guideline No. 126: Determination of the Hydrophobicity Index of Nanomaterials Through an Affinity Measurement. The webinar will present the method to determine the hydrophobicity index (Hy) of nanomaterials, through an affinity measurement, described in the OECD Test Guideline (TG) No. 126. According to OECD, webinar attendees will be able to learn the use and limitation...

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) announced on July 4, 2023, that it published a number of new, updated, and corrected Test Guidelines (TG), including the following for nanomaterials: On July 4, 2023, OECD also released a corrected version of its Report on the WNT Workshop how to prepare the Test Guidelines Programme for emerging technologies. The Working Party of the National Coordinators of the TG Program (WNT) held a workshop in December 2022 on...

Switzerland’s Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH) has updated its precautionary matrix for synthetic nanomaterials, which is a method for assessing the nano-specific health and environmental risks of nanoproducts. According to FOPH, the precautionary matrix enables the structured assessment of the “nano-specific need for precautions” when handling synthetic nanomaterials. The precautionary matrix is designed “to help industry and trade comply with their due diligence and their...

The European Commission’s (EC) Scientific Committee on Health, Environmental and Emerging Risks (SCHEER) announced the release of its final opinion on the safety of titanium dioxide in toys on June 27, 2023. Following the mandate from the EC, the scientific opinion evaluates whether the uses of pigmentary titanium dioxide in toys and toy materials can be considered to be safe in light of the exposure identified and in light of the classification of titanium dioxide...