Nanoparticles are killers - study

Now if you are like the rest of us and are partial to a few magnetic nanoparticles after a nice dinner this will be bad news.

The boffins worked out that iron oxide particles less than 10 nanometers in diameter stunt the growth of nerve cells. We guess this means they should never be smoked by pregnant women.

Other tests at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have also concluded that nanotubes shorter than 200 nanometers interfere with human lung cells, so that rules out sniffing them too.

According to the EETimes, shedloads of money is being spent working out what will happen if you happen to eat or sniff nanomaterials.

Both groups of boffins have called for nanomaterials to be tested on animals in a bid to quantify the toxic effects of nanomaterials on living organisms but to work out which are the most toxic. We would have thought even a beagle would be intelligent enough to leave a nanomaterial alone. µ