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Applied Sciences
Special Issues
Nanotechnology Challenge: Safety and Safer Design of Nanomaterials
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Nanotechnology Challenge: Safety and Safer Design of Nanomaterials

A special issue of Applied Sciences (ISSN 2076-3417). This special issue belongs to the section "Nanotechnology and Applied Nanosciences".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2021) | Viewed by 6147

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Chong Hyun (Paul) Chang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
UC Center for Environmental Implications of Nanotechnology, California NanoSystems Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
Interests: nanomaterial; nanotechnology; nanotoxicology; nanosafety; materials science and engineering; environmental engineering; applications of nanomaterials; synthesis and characterization of nanomaterials
Prof. Dr. Hyunjung Kim

E-Mail Website
Co-Guest Editor
Department of Earth Resources and Environmental Engineering, Hanyang University, 222 Wangsimni-ro, Seongdong-gu, Seoul 04763, Korea
Interests: (bio)flotation; colloid chemistry in mineral processing; resources recycling; sustainable process development; fate, transformation, and transport of nanomaterials; extractive metallurgy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nanotechnology as a field of applied science and technology is helping to improve the quality of life on multiple aspects: environment, medicine, healthcare, energy, food, etc. Through increasing demands in nanotechnology, engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) are manufactured with different physicochemical properties (e.g., size, shape, aspect ratio, crystal structure, chemical composition) for commercial and industrial products in the marketplace. However, while the market for ENMs is expected to continue to grow, the potential hazardous effects of ENMs on both humans and environment have been gaining less considerable attention. Thus, this Special Issue is to seek the challenge of nanotechnology to better understand environmental behavior, developing new approaches in safety assessment and designing safer nanomaterials.

The aim of this Special Issue includes but not limited to:

  • Structure–activity relationships at bio-interfaces;
  • Biological responses to ENMs;
  • Environmental fate and transport;
  • New tools in hazard and risk assessment of ENMs;
  • Nanomaterial characterization techniques;
  • Design and synthesis of safer nanomaterials.       

Dr. Chong Hyun (Paul) Chang
Prof. Dr. Hyunjung "Nick" Kim
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Applied Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • (Engineered) nanomaterials
  • Nanoplastics
  • Nanotechnology
  • Nanotoxicology
  • Nanosafety
  • Biosafety
  • Safe-by-design nanomaterials.

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

16 pages, 3510 KiB  
Article
Influence of Humic Acid on the Transport of Two Types of Synthesized Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles in Quartz Sand
by Donghyun Kim and Gukhwa Hwang
Appl. Sci. 2021, 11(19), 8957; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/app11198957 - 26 Sep 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1256
Abstract
In this study, transport and retention behaviors of the two types of nZnO prepared with separate manufacturing methods were compared/analyzed according to the presence/absence of Suwannee River humic acid (SRHA) adsorbed into the sand surface and the SRHA suspended in bulk solution, [...] Read more.
In this study, transport and retention behaviors of the two types of nZnO prepared with separate manufacturing methods were compared/analyzed according to the presence/absence of Suwannee River humic acid (SRHA) adsorbed into the sand surface and the SRHA suspended in bulk solution, and to changes in the solution ionic strength (0.1–10 mM) in sand-repacked water-saturated columns. In the absence of suspended SRHA, nZnO-1 breakthrough was observed only in SRHA-coated soil, and the breakthrough amount decreased with the increase in the ionic strength (23.8% to 17.2% at 0.1 mM to 10 mM, respectively). In contrast, nZnO-2 breakthrough was not observed over the entire ionic strength range, regardless of the SRHA sand coating. With the presence of suspended SRHA, neither nZnO-1 nor nZnO-2 showed a significant difference in the breakthrough amount regardless of sand coating or ionic strength. However, the breakthrough amount of nZnO-1 was higher than that of nZnO-2 (51.5% versus 37.7% at 10 mM with 1 mg/L SRHA). From confirming the difference in transport between the two types of nZnO, the amount of SRHA adsorbed into nZnO-1 was less than the amount adsorbed into nZnO-2 (0.29 mg/g versus 0.64 mg/g at 10 mM with 1 mg/L SRHA). This result was considered to be due to the larger nZnO-1 breakthrough amount than the nZnO-2 breakthrough amount, which was caused by the larger amount of suspended SRHA that could occupy the deposition sites in the nZnO-1 suspension. Because the rate of SRHA deposition on the sand surface was higher than on nZnO, nZnO transport improved in the presence of suspended SRHA, and changed according to the amount of suspended SRHA. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nanotechnology Challenge: Safety and Safer Design of Nanomaterials)
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17 pages, 1604 KiB  
Article
Influence of NOM on the Stability of Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles in Ecotoxicity Tests
by Byoung-cheun Lee, Gilsang Hong, Hyejin Lee, Pyeongsoon Kim, Do-Yeon Seo, Gukhwa Hwang, Geunbae Kim and Pilje Kim
Appl. Sci. 2020, 10(18), 6431; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/app10186431 - 15 Sep 2020
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 2729
Abstract
Nanomaterials are known to aggregate in the presence of ions. Similarly, the aggregation of zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO NPs) exposed to various ions such as sodium chloride and calcium chloride in water systems increases with the ionic strength. Therefore, for accurate toxicity studies, [...] Read more.
Nanomaterials are known to aggregate in the presence of ions. Similarly, the aggregation of zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO NPs) exposed to various ions such as sodium chloride and calcium chloride in water systems increases with the ionic strength. Therefore, for accurate toxicity studies, it is necessary to conduct a test using natural organic matters (NOMs) as additional dispersants that strengthen stability with increased repulsive forces. The three types of ecotoxicity tests based on the dispersion stability test using NOM showed that the toxicities of the three test samples decreased in the presence of NOM. To determine how NOM improved dispersion and reduced toxicities, we analyzed the ionization degree of ZnO NPs with and without NOM and found that the solubility was below 2 mg/L with a negligible change over time, implying that the ionization effect was low. The absolute value of the surface charge of particles increased in the presence of NOM, resulting in increased repulsive electrostatic forces and steric hindrance, causing less aggregation and more dispersion. Additionally, although the NOM used in the test is considered an effective dispersant that does not have a toxicological effect on aquatic organisms, the presence of NOM resulted in reduced toxicities and should be further investigated to establish it as a standard test method. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nanotechnology Challenge: Safety and Safer Design of Nanomaterials)
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8 pages, 2207 KiB  
Article
Inhibition of Estrogenic Response of Yeast Screen Assay by Exposure to Non-Lethal Levels of Metallic Nanoparticles
by Byoung-cheun Lee, Cuong N. Duong, Jungkon Kim, Suejin Kim, Ig-chun Eom and Pilje Kim
Appl. Sci. 2020, 10(11), 3796; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/app10113796 - 29 May 2020
Viewed by 1562
Abstract
In order to investigate the effects of metallic nanoparticles (NPs) on the performance of in vitro bioassay, zinc oxide NP (ZnO NP), aluminum oxide NP (Al2O3 NP), bare silver NP (Ag NP), and Ag NP capped with citrate (Agcit [...] Read more.
In order to investigate the effects of metallic nanoparticles (NPs) on the performance of in vitro bioassay, zinc oxide NP (ZnO NP), aluminum oxide NP (Al2O3 NP), bare silver NP (Ag NP), and Ag NP capped with citrate (Agcit NP) were evaluated with yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae Y190) two-hybrid system (YES assay), carrying Japanese medaka estrogen receptors (mERs) in the presence of 17β-estradiol (E2, 10−6 M), a reference chemical for estrogenic activity. The distribution of NPs in the yeast was also examined by field-emission transmission electron microscopy (FE-TEM). The results show that TEM analysis revealed that NPs were present inside the yeast and accumulated deep inside the cell organelles, suggesting that cell death was caused by NPs. However, despite no significant change of mortality, the E2 estrogenic activities in yeast exposed to ZnO NP and Al2O3 NP were dose-dependently reduced. For Ag NP and Agcit NP, such phenomenon observed in the exposure of ZnO NP and Al2O3 NP did not occur. From the observations, we found that ZnO NP and Al2O3 NP in the environmental media could result in underestimated estrogenicity of endocrine-disrupting compounds when evaluated by YES assay. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Nanotechnology Challenge: Safety and Safer Design of Nanomaterials)
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