Nanoculture: the first results of the project shared!
About 30 participants gathered online to attend the webconference "Nanoparticles in aquaculture, should we be concerned?" organized by the partners of the Nanoculture project.
As a reminder, the Nanoculture project aims to promote sustainable development in the aquaculture sector and to support the use of safe and non-toxic nanoparticles. To learn more about the project, click here.
This event presented the intermediate results of the research carried out in this project. First, the ability of living organisms to accumulate nanoparticles in their organisms. In a second step, the methodologies to study the risks of human exposure to the presence of nanoparticles, as well as the development in situ of nanoparticle detection sensors.
In the framework of the project, the species studied are mussels, turbot and algae. These are the species most used in aquaculture in the Atlantic area. For nanoparticles they are titanium dioxide (TiO2) and silver (Ag) nanoparticles, two of the most used metallic nanoparticles in industries.
Research regarding the ability of living organisms (mussels and turbot) to accumulate the nanoparticles studied here does not show accumulation of materials in tissues after exposure. However, a modification of the cells has been identified showing a disruption of their ultrastructure. The studies are still in progress on algae for the different issues of the project.
Studies are also underway for the risks of possible impact on humans after consumption of aquaculture products exposed to nanoparticles.
The sensors in situ developed for the detection of nanoparticles rely on the photocatalytic properties of nanoparticles. The project partners developed a filter (composed of titanate nanowires) capable of capturing and concentrating nanoparticles, and the addition of an organic dye, which when exposed to UV light in the presence of nanoparticles is degraded, then loses its color/fluorescence. From this principle, they also succeeded in increasing their detection sensitivity by using specific spectrometric methods (surface exalted Raman scattering: SERS).
