CARBON NANOTUBES PASS SAFETY TEST

A NEW STUDY COULD ALLAY some of the fears about health and safety issues relating to carbon nanotubes and open the door for exploring the use of such nanomaterials in the human body. In the study, mice were intravenously administered functionalized, water- soluble carbon nanotubes, either single-walled or multiwalled. Electron microscopy analysis revealed that both types of nanotubes are excreted intact in urine. The work was carried out at the Centre for Drug Delivery Research at the University of London's School of Pharmacy and was led by Kostas Kostarelos, deputy head of the center, in collaboration with organic chemists Alberto Bianco at the CNRS Institute of Molecular & Cellular Biology, in Strasbourg, France, and Maurizio Prato of the University of Trieste, in Italy (Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, published online, dx.doi. org/10.1073/pnas.0509009103). "This is the first time carbon nanotubes have been administered intravenously and fundamental pharmacokinetic parameters have been obtained," Kostarelos...