The paper:
H.S. Choi et al., "Renal clearance of quantum dots," Nat Biotech, 25:1165–70. (Cited in 74 papers)
The finding:
Hak Soo Choi and John Frangioni of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, Mass., wanted to maximize the safety profile of quantum dots—nanoscale semiconductor particles loaded with toxic heavy metals. The researchers injected mice with quantum dots ranging from 1 to 20 nm in diameter and showed that the animals could get rid of dots smaller than 5.5 nm through the kidneys, but larger particles accumulated in the spleen, liver, and lungs.
The impact:
"All the bio-applications of nanotechnology have some problems because of safety issues," says Hitasaka Kobayashi, an imaging scientist at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., who was not involved in the research. Thus, this study helped define guidelines that other researchers can now use to minimize the toxicity of nano-sized particles, he notes.
...
