For Science, Nanotech Poses Big Unknowns

February 2, 2004 | Source: Washington Post

The risks of nanoparticles may ultimately prove to be minor and avoidable, experts say. Nonetheless, in a move that industry supporters blame on a conflation of facts with popular fiction — such as Michael Crichton’s best-selling thriller “Prey,” in which rogue nanoparticles wreak deadly havoc — activists have begun to organize against the science.

And the first two studies to look for such problems appeared in the January issue of the journal Toxicological Sciences, and the results, experts said, are less than reassuring.