Collaborative Research: The Unintended Ecological Consequences of Nanomaterials: Effects of nanotitania in benthic systems

1067751/1067439灰色/凯利社会见证了纳米技术从发现到商业化的快速过渡。原子和分子工程的这场革命承诺了许多环境和人类健康方面的好处，例如效率的显著提高，资源使用和废物产生的减少，以及医疗诊断和治疗方面的惊人改进。然而，纳米技术对生态和环境健康构成的风险尚未得到严格评估，没有这些数据，就无法制定一个有意义的监管框架，以保护人类和环境的健康和安全，并指导纳米材料的发展。纳米材料(NMS)的特征是其尺寸(至少一个维度为100 nm或更小)，属于单个原子和分子与块体材料之间的过渡区。较小的尺寸、新颖的形状和较高的比表面积为纳米材料带来了不同寻常和新颖的物理化学性质，并为表面功能化、靶向反应和稳健的材料开发提供了几乎无限的可能性。然而，这些特征为工程、科学和医疗应用提供了意想不到的机会，也可能对人类健康和生态系统完整性构成威胁。目前，几乎不可能对北卡罗来纳州的环境命运和影响做出预测。尺寸、形状和表面功能的细微变化对化学和物理行为有深远的影响。此外，缺乏在机械层面上筛选和询问系统以及严格确定剂量效应的协议。这项研究的目的是研究一种具有代表性的纳米材料(各种形式的纳米二氧化钛)在生物和环境系统中的基本相互作用，从亚细胞到生态系统，以开发一种全面表征纳米级二氧化钛生态毒性的测试和测量策略。申请者提出了一个为期三年的合作研究项目，包括来自西北大学(NU)的环境工程师和科学家，以及芝加哥洛约拉大学(LUC)的生态学家。该项目将NU和LUC在生态领域存在的纳米材料合成和表征的独特能力结合起来，使我们能够阐明NM对底栖生态系统结构和功能的影响。这项拟议的工作是基于NU和LUC研究人员之间的长期合作，并将在适合在多个尺度上询问生物系统中的NM效应的新型实验设备中进行。鉴于围绕该项目的合作优势和已建立的基础设施，拟议研究的学术价值有望在理解NM特征、环境命运和生物后果之间的关系方面取得关键进展，并探索生态系统对NM暴露的反应的机制基础。随着合成最先进的二氧化钛纳米材料的能力，这项研究将通过详细描述正在研究的纳米二氧化钛的物理和化学性质，提高对纳米材料的环境、健康和安全方面的表征，这些纳米材料目前是使用更广泛的纳米材料，而且未来可能会使用得更广泛。这将通过在相关条件下测量NM的去向、运输和环境稳定性，并在多个尺度上进行生态毒理测试来实现。这项研究结果的更广泛影响不仅将为NM健康和安全的系统评估提供信息，并将成为制定有意义的政策的必要科学基础的典范，而且还将说明为设计和生产环境安全的NMS提供批判性反馈的战略。这项研究承诺了与纳米技术本身的技术革命平行的变革性见解，并将有助于指导纳米技术沿着降低生态毒性的路线发展。他们建议超越与单一成分反应(例如，活性氧物种)相关的生物标记物的识别，以发现有意义的NM定义，而不仅仅是基于系统一级发出复杂化学和生物相互作用信号的大小和生物指示剂的性质。这项研究的结果将说明全面的生态毒理学测试的可行性，但也将揭示筛选结果在多大程度上可以预测系统水平的反应。这项拟议的合作研究的更广泛影响也与大学前、本科生、研究生和研究生各级的教育以及社区一级的外联活动密切相关。研究小组将促进生态学家、环境工程师、分子生物学家和分析化学家之间的跨学科交流。NU和Luc都对本科教育做出了坚定的承诺，并积极让本科生参与研究。NU和LUC都有一个强大的指导环境，将培养不同学生团队的科学发展。

1067751/1067439Gray/KellySociety is seeing the rapid transition of nanotechnology as it moves from discovery to commercialization. This revolution in atomic and molecular engineering promises many environmental and human health benefits such as dramatic improvements in efficiency, reduced resource use and waste production, and astounding improvements in medical diagnostics and therapeutics. Yet, the risks posed by nanotechnology to ecological and environmental health have not been rigorously assessed, and without these data a meaningful regulatory framework to protect human and environmental health and safety and guide the development of nanomaterials cannot be formulated. The defining characteristic of nanomaterials (NMs) is their size (at least one dimension of 100 nm or less), which falls into a transitional zone between individual atoms and molecules, and bulk materials. The small sizes, novel shapes, and high surface areas promote unusual and novel physicochemical properties to NMs and make possible nearly infinite possibilities for surface functionalization, targeted reactivity and robust material development. These very features, however, open unimagined opportunity for engineering, scientific and medical applications may also pose threats to human health and ecosystem integrity. At this time it is virtually impossible to make predictions about NM environmental fate and impact. Subtle changes in size, shape and surface functionality have profound effects on chemical and physical behavior. Furthermore, the protocols to screen and then, interrogate systems at the mechanistic level and to determine dose effects rigorously are lacking. The purpose of the proposed research is to study fundamental interactions of a representative nanomaterial (various forms of nanotitania) in biological and environmental systems at increasing scale, from subcellular through ecosystem, in order to develop a testing and measurement strategy that comprehensively characterizes the ecotoxicity of nano-scaled TiO2. The applicants propose a three-year collaborative research project that involves environmental engineers and scientists from Northwestern University (NU) and ecologists Loyola University of Chicago (LUC). This project combines the unique capabilities of nanomaterial synthesis and characterization that exist at NU with those at LUC in the field of ecology that will allow us to elucidate the effects of NM on the structure and function of benthic ecosystems. The proposed work is based on a long running collaboration among NU and LUC researchers and will be performed in novel experimental facilities well adapted to interrogating NM effects in biological systems at multiple scales. In view of the collaborative strengths and established infrastructure surrounding this project, the intellectual merit of the proposed study promises to make critical advances in understanding the relationships between NM characteristics, environmental fate and biological consequence and to probe the mechanistic basis for ecosystem responses to NM exposure. With the ability to synthesize state-of-the-art TiO2 NMs that are currently the more widely used nanoscale materials and are likely to be used even more extensively in the future, this research will improve the characterization of the environmental, health and safety aspects of NM by detailing the physical and chemical properties of the nanotitania under study. This will be accomplished by measuring the fate, transport and environmental stability of NM under relevant conditions, and conducting ecotoxicological testing at multiple scales. The broader impacts of the results of this study will not only inform the systematic evaluation of NM health and safety and serve as a model for developing the necessary scientific basis for meaningful policy formulation, but they will also illustrate a strategy to supply critical feedback to the design and production of environmentally-safe NMs. This research promises transformative insights that parallel the technology revolution of nanotechnology, itself and will help to guide NM development along routes of reduced ecotoxicity. They propose to move beyond the identification of biomarkers associated with single component responses (e.g., reactive oxygen species) to discover meaningful NM definitions based on properties not simply size and bioindicators that signal complex chemical and biological interactions at the system level. The results of this research will illustrate the feasibility of comprehensive ecotoxicological testing, but will also reveal the extent to which screening results are predictive of system level response. The broader impacts of this proposed collaborative research are also strongly connected to education at the pre-college, undergraduate, graduate and post-graduate levels, as well as to community level outreach. The research team will promote interdisciplinary exchange among ecologists, environmental engineers, molecular biologists and analytical chemists. Both NU and LUC have strong commitments to undergraduate education and actively involve undergrads in research. A strong mentoring environment exists at both NU and LUC and will nurture the scientific development of a diverse team of students.