Emissive Products Enable to Generate Nanoparticles or Submicronic Particles

Characterizing nanomaterial emissions is a complex task. Are we talking about emissions into water or into the air? What are the shapes, sizes and compositions of the objects emitted? How can we characterize exposure? How can nanomaterials giving rise to emissions be solicited? What route of exposure can we suspect, or what toxicity might the emitted nanoparticle have? In addition to these general questions, there are the technical difficulties of characterizing emissions: a universal tool capable of exhaustively describing the objects emitted, whatever their size or shape, does not yet exist.

So, after describing as fully as possible the use of nanomaterials in our society, the aim of this article is to describe the state of the art in the characterization of emitted nanoparticles, from the point of view of both traditional methods and the latest technological advances. The inhalation route of exposure is generally considered to be the main one. Aerosol characterization methods are therefore the focus of this article. Devices capable of such characterization are described, and their limitations, where they exist, are also discussed. As exposure to nanoparticles is a growing source of concern, the article also presents the main principles of nanosafety. In this way, all industrialists interested in the subject can eventually appropriate these concepts in order to limit or even eliminate possible releases due to new materials.