
Nanoparticles: Toxins in our air too small to see - pseudolus
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20191113-the-toxic-killers-in-our-air-too-small-to-see
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daenz
What is this meant to inspire? The researchers featured have become arguably
as neurotic you might imagine:

>Kaur still finds her own habits influenced by her nanoparticle research, over
a decade later. “My friends find it hilarious that I’m hugging the building
side when I walk along a pavement!” she laughs. “Wherever possible I cut
through the park or I take the side roads.”

>In Edinburgh, Raftis goes a step further. “I stopped burning candles in my
house. I don’t use or have a log burner at home, even though I like them... I
always have the extraction on when I cook food. I don’t go for runs along
roads, I always run in a park. I don’t drive and don’t think I consciously
could do unless it was an electric car.”

If an article whose message is basically "Toxic particles are everywhere,
unavoidable, pragmatically undetectable, and they're killing you" isn't fear
mongering, then I don't know what is. I'm just surprised I don't see any ads
for air purification systems on the page.

>She cycles, despite the proximity to high particle counts, because “even if
you cycle in heavy traffic you are offsetting the exposure to air pollution
with exercise.”

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but you can't "offset" pollution with
exercise. If toxic nanoparticles in your blood stream is killing your cells,
then strengthening your cardiovascular system isn't "cancelling" it out. The
content and motivation of this article is very questionable.

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jshaqaw
To me it inspires supporting electrification of automobiles.

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oakwhiz
Tire dust and brake dust is still generated by electric vehicles.

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p1mrx
EVs don't generate as much brake dust, because regenerative braking leaves
less work for the friction brakes.

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cosmolev
Do we know whether HEPA filters are also effective against those nanoparticles
or are they only effective against the PM2.5 and PM10?

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Brakenshire
As I understand HEPA filters usually remove particles down to about 20nm,
which will capture a good chunk, PM2.5 is 2500nm so far smaller than that.
Although it may well be that the very small particles are most able to
penetrate our biological barriers, and are therefore the most dangerous. This
is an active area of research and I think still not fully understood.

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uli_the_maniac
The study linked in this comment tree mentions

> The study was also the first to investigate the filtering of very small
> nanocluster particles down to 1.3 nanometres in size. These are close to
> being gas molecules, but their filtration properties are different. All of
> the air filters that were tested effectively removed nanocluster particles
> smaller than 3 nanometres, which means that particles of this size are
> unlikely to enter indoor areas.

With HEPA filters being the most effective ones removing "100% of root
nanoparticles"

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08-15
Does anyone have insight into the chemistry of these nanoparticles?

Because, clearly, cars don't emit gold. Cars do emit platinum and palladium
from degrading catalysts, but these don't condense from a gas phase, as the
article implies. The article also mentions particles formed from NO2, but
these particles would be nitrate salts, which dissolve in blood and therefore
aren't particles anymore. The same is true for much "kicked up dust"; calcium,
magnesium, iron compounds would dissolve, too. All of these ions are present
in blood anyway, so a tiny bit more makes no difference.

So what are we really talking about? Soot? Anything else?

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ksab
Outdoors: Particles less than 50nm often arise from sulphuric acid. Nucleation
occurs with sulphur dioxide and water in vehicle exhaust and these particles
undergo growth via condensation of organic compounds as the exhaust plume
cools.

Larger particles (50-100nm) are typically soot.

Indoor Sources: cooking (frying especially), burning candles/incense, heating
elements on stove tops and toasters, chemical reactions between lemon/pine
scented cleaners with ozone.

Source: PhD in exposure to ultrafine particles.

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leoplct
What the solution?

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11235813213455
The only viable solution for the environment is not space travel like Elon
Musk would argue, it's not electric cars, it's not CO2 sequestration
[https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-create-a-material-
th...](https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-create-a-material-that-
converts-co2-into-useful-organic-matter) since like this article shows, there
are so many diverse pollutants, the solution is that people reduce their
consumption drastically.

For example, stopping with all the unnecessary things like cosmetic products,
eat much less
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2007/jul/19/climatec...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2007/jul/19/climatechange.climatechange),
use non-polluant transports, reuse, repair all the things, and so many more
things that have big impact on one's environmental footprint. If people reduce
by 2 their environmental footprint, it's virtually cutting by a half the world
population, and the world production that just serves consumption

I've been living the "minimalist"/non-consumerist and happy lifestyle since
I'm a student, I'm likely polluting less than 10% of the average adult in my
country (France), at this rate out planet would sustain 10 billion people
without our current environmental damages

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wizzwizz4
Electric cars help. CO₂ sequestration helps. Reducing consumption helps.

It's not an either-or thing.

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ngcc_hk
Anything can filter dioxin?

