Human health risk factors associated with the application of nanomaterials : A review

Abstract

During their application, behavior of nanomaterials can differ from the generally known, widely applied, considering their risks, familiar, legislated materials. Since they gained importance rapidly, we did not have enough time to study the mechanism of action of these materials in details. The short- and long-term effects of these materials are only scarcely known or not known. However, since the middle of the 2000s decade, an increasing trend can be noticed regarding the scientific literature dealing with the risk assessment of nanomaterials. It is important to pay special attention to the full life-cycle of the nanomaterials and to know the short- and long-term effects of some processes like mining, production, application, deposition, neutralization on our environment and on the health and security of the directly or indirectly affected people. In our paper we examine in detail the effects which can have an effect on human health and safety during the application of nanomaterials. We summarized the collected parameters to be tested, and we cathegorized them into topic areas in order to give assistance in the preparation risk assessments associated with nanomaterials, thus even the laymen can have a good overview on the critical factors in aspects of human health.