NATURE NANOTECHNOLOGY | VOL 5 | FEBRUARY 2010 | www.nature.com/naturenanotechnology 93 commentary Reported nanosafety practices in research laboratories worldwide Francisco Balas, Manuel Arruebo, Jone Urrutia and Jesus Santamaria An online survey shows that most researchers do not use suitable personal and laboratory protection equipment when handling nanomaterials that could become airborne. T he possibility of nanomaterials having an adverse impact on human health and the environment has been a cause for concern for a number of years 1–7 and various guidelines on handling nanomaterials have been published 8–15 . hese guidelines generally recommend the use of laboratory protection equipment (such as implementation of barriers around a hazardous source to prevent its dissemination or HEPA (high-eiciency particulate air)-iltered exhaust streams), and personal protection equipment (such as suitable respirators, face shields and gloves). Here we report the results of a survey of safety practices in laboratories handling nanomaterials. We ind that only about 10% of researchers who are working with nanomaterials reported using nano- enabled hoods, and one in four did not use any type of general laboratory protection. Despite knowing that the materials they made could become airborne, about 30% of researchers did not use any type of personal respiratory protection. Furthermore, many research laboratories dispose of nanomaterials in the same way they dispose of other chemicals. Previous surveys of nanosafety practices have concentrated on industrial settings 16–18 and these surveys found that most companies working with nanomaterials used some type of engineering controls (measures aimed at reducing hazards at their source and other exposures), and that large companies were more likely to combine several types of general protection. A survey of Swiss companies handling nanoparticles 17 showed that a number of diferent nanosize materials were already being used in quantities exceeding 1 ton yr −1 per company, with the median quantity of handled nanoparticles being 100 kg yr −1 . In a diferent survey 16 , 82% of organizations reported making nanospeciic personal protection equipment (PPE) recommendations to employees. he use of PPE alone was also more common in organizations handling nanomaterials in the liquid phase 17 and in smaller companies 18 . In the survey reported here, the vast majority (95%) of the 240 respondents came from universities or public research laboratories. he questions covered: details of the materials and processing methods used; safety measures; waste disposal procedures; and knowledge of legislation for handling nanomaterials. he researchers invited for the survey were selected from a literature search as described in the Methods section, and the characteristics of the respondents are shown in Supplementary Table S1. he geographic distribution of the respondents was: Europe, 39.6%; Asia, 37.1%; North America, 17.9%; rest of the world, 5.5%. Half of the respondents (56.4%) came from large institutions with over 1,000 workers. he proportion of small (up to 10 workers) and medium-size (10–50 workers) research groups that participated was similar at 43.5% and 49.3%, respectively, and only 7.2% came from large laboratories with more than 50 workers. 63.1% of the respondents had worked on nanomaterials for at least ive years and were therefore, experienced in nanotechnology. Around 90% of the respondents were either not aware of or did not think there were regulations at the local or national levels for handling nanomaterials (Fig. 1). his is not surprising because only a few regulations on nanomaterials have been enacted. More surprising, however, is that nearly three quarters of respondents reported not having internal rules to follow regarding the handling of nanomaterials; approximately half did not have rules and 27.1% were not aware of any internal regulations. Of the nanomaterials used by the respondents, inorganic materials constituted the largest group (42.2%) in the nanoparticle category, whereas carbon-based nanotubes (31.9%) were most common in the nanotubes/nanowires National/Federal Local/State Organization 10.4% 40.3% 49.3% 45.0% 45.9% 9.1% 24.4% 48.4% 27.1% Yes No Don’t know Figure 1 | Awareness of regulations concerning the handling of nanomaterials. Around 90% of the respondents were either not aware of or did not think there were regulations at the local or national levels for handling nanomaterials. © 20 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved 10