Abstract
The presence of nanoparticles in many industrial applications and daily products is making it nowadays crucial to assess their impact when exposed to the environment. Metallic nickel nanoparticles (Ni NPs) are of high industrial interest due to their ability to catalyze the reversible hydration of CO2 to carbonic acid at ambient conditions. We characterized metallic Ni NPs by XRD, HRTEM and EDS and determined the solubility of free nickel ions from 3 mg/L metallic Ni NPs in seawater by ICP-MS over 96 h, which was below 3%. Further, embryonic development of the sea urchin Paracentrotus lividus was investigated for 48 h in the presence of metallic Ni NPs (0.03 mg/L to 3 mg/L), but no lethal effects were observed. However, 3 mg/L metallic Ni NPs caused a size reduction similar to 1.2 mg/L NiCl2*6 H2O. The obtained results contribute to current studies on metallic Ni NPs and point to their consequences for the marine ecosystem.
Highlights
Today, there is a great variety of engineered nanoparticles (NPs) available that find use in numerous applications due to their favorable properties (Ju-Nam and Lead, 2008)
The size distribution of metallic nickel nanoparticles (Ni NPs) was analyzed by high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) using a JEOL 2100F field emission gun instrument operating at 200 keV located in Durham University, UK, as reported previously (Bhaduri and Siller, 2013a)
For 3 mg/L significant agglomeration of metallic Ni NPs has been observed in both deionized water and Artificial seawater (ASW), which is expected to hinder metallic Ni NPs ion dissolution due to smaller surface area (Baker et al, 2014). These results show that nickel ion dissolution occurs for metallic Ni NPs over time and highlights that ion dissolution from metallic Ni NPs in seawater is a crucial property and a critical factor for potential toxicity, as it was already evidenced for other NPs (Misra et al, 2012; Maurer et al, 2014)
Summary
There is a great variety of engineered nanoparticles (NPs) available that find use in numerous applications due to their favorable properties (Ju-Nam and Lead, 2008). As a consequence of their application they can reach surrounding ecosystems, including estuarine, freshwater and marine ecosystems, for example by wastewater output or aerial deposition (Wiesner et al, 2006; Baker et al, 2014) Their potential effect on the environment and therein living organisms is still investigated insufficiently (Nowack and Bucheli, 2007; Ju-Nam and Lead, 2008) and suitable tools to identify interactions of NP with organic material are still deficient in order to achieve a better understanding and determine guidelines for their safe application (Love et al, 2012; Smita et al, 2012). The effect of metallic Ni NPs when exposed to the environment, including freshwater and marine ecosystems, remains to be investigated in order to ensure their safe use
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