By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe European Commission’s (EC) Scientific Committee on Health, Environmental and Emerging Risks (SCHEER) published on January 14, 2019, a statement and a position paper on emerging health and environmental issues. SCHEER identified and prioritized 14 emerging issues to bring to the attention of the EC services, including: Micro- and nano-plastic in the environment (priority is… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,ResearchThe European Union (EU) Observatory for Nanomaterials (EUON) conducts up to three studies annually. The studies are intended to address knowledge gaps relating to nanomaterials that are of interest to the general public and the research community. EUON announced on January 14, 2019, that it is now looking for topic suggestions that could be addressed… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in InternationalThe Nanotechnology Industries Association (NIA) will hold a webinar on January 24, 2019, on “Nano in Business: Commercialization of nanomaterials.” This is the first webinar in NIA’s “Nano in Business” series, which is dedicated to the roadmap to commercial success for nanomaterials. This includes not only the launch of companies, but also successfully bringing materials… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Research,United StatesThe December 2018 issue of the Journal of Nanoparticle Research includes an article entitled “A survey on the state of nanosafety research in the European Union and the United States.” According to the abstract, the authors surveyed researchers in the field of environmental safety and health of nanomaterials between September 2017 and January 2018 to… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,ResearchIn December 2018, the International Standardization Organization (ISO) published standard SO/TS 16195:2018, “Nanotechnologies — Specification for developing representative test materials consisting of nano-objects in dry powder form.” The standard specifies development of representative test materials consisting of nano-objects in dry powder form to enable test method development and improve comparability of data for nanotechnology applications.… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Occupational Health and Safety IssuesOn December 7, 2018, the Occupational Cancer Research Center (OCRC) held a seminar on “Perspectives on Mitigating Exposures to Engineered Nanomaterials in the Workplace.” The seminar was part of the Occupational and Environmental Health seminar series supported by the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, Public Health Ontario, OCRC, and the Center for Research Expertise… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe European Commission (EC) announced on December 3, 2018, that it adopted amendments to several Annexes of the Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) regulation to clarify the information requirements for nanomaterials. The EC notes that REACH “has always applied to nanomaterials, but did not contain specific provisions for them, which is why… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe Swedish National Platform for Nanosafety (SweNanoSafe) has posted a report on the European Chemicals Agency’s (ECHA) November 8-9, 2018, workshop on the upcoming Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) information requirements for nanomaterials. As reported in our April 26, 2018, blog item, the European Commission (EC) REACH Committee voted on April 26,… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe European Union (EU) released the EU US Roadmap Nanoinformatics 2030 on November 15, 2018. The Roadmap, developed by scientists from the EU, U.S., and a few other countries, is a compilation of state-of-the-art commentaries from multiple interconnecting scientific fields, combined with issues involving nanomaterial risk assessment and governance. The Roadmap states that in bringing… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesOn November 7, 2018, the European Commission’s (EC) Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS) published the tenth revision of The SCCS Notes of Guidance for the Testing of Cosmetic Ingredients and Their Safety Evaluation. The guidance contains relevant information on the different aspects of testing and safety evaluation of cosmetic substances in Europe. The document… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory Issues,ResearchOn November 5, 2018, the European Commission’s (EC) Joint Research Center (JRC) announced the availability of the NANoREG Toolbox, an inventory of publicly available tools for the safety assessment of nanomaterials. As reported in our October 5, 2017, blog item, JRC first published the inventory as a Microsoft Excel®-based dataset. JRC scientists have now published… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesOn October 26, 2018, the European Commission (EC) Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS) published its final opinion on colloidal silver (nano). According to the final opinion, the EC received 63 notifications of cosmetic products containing colloidal silver in nano form. The final opinion states that, according to the applicants, the ingredient is used in… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe European Commission (EC) Joint Research Center (JRC) posted a report on the October 5-6, 2017, “NanoReg2 Regulatory Preparedness for Innovation in Nanotechnology Workshop.” Regulatory preparedness was defined at the workshop as the regulators’ timely awareness of innovations and the regulators’ actions to check whether present legislation covers all safety aspects of each innovation, including… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,ResearchThe European Commission (EC) Joint Research Center (JRC) announced publication of a paper introducing a new standardized testing procedure for nanomaterial environmental toxicity, “Introducing a new standardized nanomaterial environmental toxicity screening testing procedure, ISO/TS 20787: aquatic toxicity assessment of manufactured nanomaterials in saltwater lakes using Artemia sp. nauplii.” The abstract states that the testing procedure… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory Issues,Occupational Health and Safety IssuesIn August 2018, Safe Work Australia (SWA) issued a national guide on classifying hazardous chemicals. SWA intends the guidance for manufacturers and importers of substances, mixtures, and articles who have a duty under the Work Health and Safety (WHS) Act and Regulations to classify them. SWA suggests that the guidance may also be useful for… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe Nanotechnology Industries Association (NIA) announced on October 5, 2018, that the NanoReg2 project, of which NIA is a partner, has published a comprehensive review of European Union (EU) legislation addressing chemical substances and the potential for grouping and read across in nanomaterials. The article, “Insights into possibilities for grouping and read-across for nanomaterials in… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory IssuesThe Environment Council of the Council of the European Union (EU) met on October 9, 2018. According to the outcome of the Council meeting, the items debated under any other business included the “Berlin Declaration” on nanomaterials, submitted by the German delegation and supported by the French and Luxembourg delegations. The Berlin Declaration summarizes the… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory Issues,Occupational Health and Safety IssuesOn October 3, 2018, the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) published an info sheet on “Manufactured nanomaterials in the workplace.” According to the info sheet, “[t]he requirements for managing nanomaterials in the workplace are the same as those for managing other hazardous chemicals, including the provision of information and training for… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in EU Member State,International,Occupational Health and Safety Issues,ResearchThe German Environment Agency (UBA) in October 2018 published a study entitled Health Effects of Ultrafine Particles: Systematic literature search and the potential transferability of the results to the German setting. The study notes that ultrafine particles represent the smallest size fractions of particles with sizes from one to about 100 nanometers in aerodynamic diameter. … Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory Issues,OECD,ResearchOn September 12-13, 2018, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), NanoReg2, and GRACIOUS hosted a “Scientific Workshop: Grouping of Nanomaterials.” The Workshop brought together 120 nanotechnology specialists from Europe, North America, and Asia to discuss a bottleneck in nanomaterials development and testing. The agenda and the following slides from the workshop have been… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,Legal/Regulatory Issues,OECDThe Nanotechnology Industries Association (NIA) published an open newsletter on September 19, 2018, that includes an invitation to NIA’s October 11, 2018, open webinar on regulatory priorities. The open webinar will cover the latest news on the nanomaterials definition, amendments to the Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) Annexes, the Organization for Economic… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in International,OECD,ResearchOn September 21, 2018, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) announced four new case studies on integrated approaches for testing and assessment (IATA), including a Case Study on Grouping and Read-Across for Nanomaterials — Genotoxicity of Nano-TiO2. The European Union (EU) Joint Research Center (JRC) developed the case study for the genotoxicity of… Continue Reading
By Lynn L. Bergeson and Carla N. Hutton on Posted in EU Member State,International,Occupational Health and Safety Issues,ResearchGermany’s Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA) has published a report entitled Comparison of Inhalation and Intratracheal Instillation as Testing Methods for Characterisation of Granular Biopersistent Particles (GBP). In Project F 2364, researchers conducted an in vivo validation study to evaluate the consistency of data with results obtained in the preceding intratracheal instillation… Continue Reading
