{"id":961,"date":"2010-09-23T16:53:18","date_gmt":"2010-09-23T21:53:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/nanotechnology\/?p=961"},"modified":"2026-04-02T14:46:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T19:46:07","slug":"sludging-through-the-nano-lifecycle-caution-ahead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/2010\/09\/23\/sludging-through-the-nano-lifecycle-caution-ahead\/","title":{"rendered":"Sludging through the nano lifecycle: Caution ahead"},"content":{"rendered":"

Richard Denison, Ph.D.<\/em>, is a Senior Scientist.<\/em><\/p>\n

Researchers at Virginia Tech have identified and characterized silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) in the sewage sludge produced by an operating municipal wastewater treatment plant.\u00a0 The study is notable in several respects:\u00a0 It is the first time AgNPs have been detected in a field-scale study, one of a real-world operation representative of a real-world exposure scenario to boot. \u00a0It shows that silver can exist in wastewater treatment products as nanoparticles.\u00a0 It indicates such particles may be most likely to partition to sludge under common treatment technologies.\u00a0 And it suggests that silver may be chemically transformed in the course of wastewater treatment.<\/p>\n

The study did not<\/em> demonstrate that the AgNPs detected in the sludge originated from products containing such nanoparticles, as some news stories<\/a> have suggested, although the authors indicate such a source “is likely.”\u00a0 But the findings have important implications for nano safety nonetheless.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

The study, by Michael Hochella and colleagues at Virginia Tech, appears in Environmental Science & Technology<\/a> (web publication dated September 14, 2010).\u00a0 The authors were motivated no doubt by the fact that nanosilver is already in widespread use in a host of consumer products, which they identify as including food storage containers, coating materials, liquid fabric softeners and detergents, fabrics and clothing, sporting goods, dietary supplements, cleaning and personal-care products, cosmetics, and medical appliances based on data from the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies product database<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Given that AgNPs are almost certainly being released into municipal wastewater from at least some of these products (as has been shown, for example, from the laundering of nanosilver-impregnated socks<\/a>), the authors looked for AgNPs in sewage sludge from a publically-owned treatment works (POTW) they indicated is “located in a metropolitan area of the Midwest.”\u00a0 They chose it because of the high concentration of silver in the sludge (856 milligrams per kilogram), and the absence of any known industrial sources of silver that might be releasing silver into the wastewater treated by the plant.<\/p>\n

Nanosilver detected<\/strong><\/p>\n

The authors detected AgNPs in the sludge using electron microscopy, which revealed elliptical particles of 5-20 nanometers (nm) in diameter, clustered in “very small, loosely packed aggregates.”\u00a0 They identified the particles to be comprised of silver sulfide (Ag2<\/sub>S) nanocrystals, and speculate that the particles were most likely formed during wastewater treatment under anaerobic conditions, starting either with AgNPs or silver ions, as has been shown in lab studies<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ag2<\/sub>S has very low water solubility, which may at least partly explain the partitioning of such nanoparticles to the sludge during wastewater treatment.\u00a0 Of course, its removal from wastewater is by no means the end of the road, as the sludge must subsequently be managed.\u00a0 That typically means landfilling, incineration or \u2013 for about half of all sewage sludge in the U.S.<\/a> \u2013 application to agricultural lands as a fertilizer or soil amendment.<\/p>\n

In other words, any nanosilver released from products will eventually re-enter the environment.\u00a0 We’ve blogged here before<\/a> about some of the potential implications of adding more silver (nano or otherwise) into the environment, including the potential to suppress plant growth and soil microbial activity<\/a> and the potential to create silver-resistant bacteria<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Painted surfaces as sources of nanoparticle release<\/strong><\/p>\n

While this study did not directly demonstrate migration of nanosilver from products into wastewater into sludge and into the environment, it certainly connected some of those dots.\u00a0 Another study of nano-titanium dioxide (TiO2<\/sub>)<\/a> used as a pigment in paints connected even more:\u00a0 It traced such nanoparticles as they moved from both new and weathered painted surfaces into runoff and thence into surface waters.\u00a0 Based on projected volumes of use and types of applications, some researchers<\/a> have suggested that migration of such nanoparticles could yield levels in surface waters close to or exceeding the levels at which toxicity to aquatic organisms has been observed.<\/p>\n

All of this adds weight to argument that we need to proceed with considerable caution as we consider or pursue nano applications, especially those that are dispersive in nature or can lead to nanoparticle releases from substrates or surfaces that may be exposed to the elements or biota during any stage of the material’s lifecycle<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist. Researchers at Virginia Tech have identified and characterized silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) in the sewage sludge produced by an operating municipal wastewater treatment plant.\u00a0 The study is notable in several respects:\u00a0 It is the first time AgNPs have been detected in a field-scale study, one of a real-world operation …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56087],"tags":[5019,39171,39209],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nanotechnology","tag-consumer-products","tag-exposure-vs-hazard","tag-nanosilver"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/100"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=961"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13690,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/961\/revisions\/13690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=961"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}