
Combustion-derived nanoparticles in Alzheimer disease development: study - okket
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2017-06-culprit-hidden-plain-sight-alzheimer.html
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Tharkun
I guess fine Particulate Matter (PM) is the lead of the 21st century.
Hopefully findings like these (and those linking it to cardiovascular issues)
will prompt legislators to action.

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hammock
Fine particulate matter was the lede of last century too. Asbestos
(mesothelioma), talcum powder (ovarian cancer), titanium dioxide (it's in
everything), plastic microbeads (voluntarily discontinued), 9/11 cleanup crew
issues, Doritos flavor dust (I saw an article on this somewhere...)

How do we solve particulate getting in your brain though? Nanorobots for
removal?

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extra88
I think Tharkun mean "lead" as in leaded gasoline and lead paint.

~~~
hammock
Good one, thanks. In that case I would expand lead to be heavy metals
generally (lead, mercury, cadmium, arsenic etc)

~~~
Tharkun
Ah yes, sorry about the confusion. I was indeed talking about lead (Pb), or
rather tetramethyllead as it was added to gasoline as an anti-knocking agent
last century. It's something that was suspected to be bad early on, but the
scale of it wasn't realized until much later. Of course, political nonsense
and corruption came into play as well.

Just like now.

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giardini
Magnetic air filters for the home, anyone? Its an untouched market!

Not to mention magnetic filters for motorcyclists. Asia is full of
motorcyclists who use dust masks. Adding a "magnetic filter", even one barely
effective, might be very popular in Hanoi and Saigon, for example:

[https://www.google.com/search?q=motorcyclists+in+saigon+wear...](https://www.google.com/search?q=motorcyclists+in+saigon+wearing+masks&client=opera&hs=fJq&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiDt_TFwbbUAhUKw4MKHSm2Dj0Q_AUICigB&biw=1105&bih=845)

Finally, an application for old disk drive magnets!8-)): grind them up into
coarse domain-sized grains at low temperature (so they don't lose their
magnetism) and then toss them into the paper/fiber pulp mixture used to make
masks. You should get a mask that filters the usual particles and also
captures iron nanoparticles.

Add a few billboards on major highways depicting nursing-home residents with
Alzheimers' disease and saying "Don't end up like this!" and those masks will
be flying off the shelves. Profit!

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exhilaration
This sounds like a pretty brilliant idea to me, why isn't it already on the
market? The article specifically calls the problematic particles "airborne
iron-rich strongly magnetic combustion-derived nanoparticles (CDNPs)".

~~~
giardini
It _has_ been discussed before: I just found a 2007 paper about dust problems
in lunar living environments; the suggested solution is a magnetic air filter.
Their solution is different of course (I was simply brainstorming about the
powdered domains solution - there are many ways to magnetically filter
particles from the air):

"DUST MITIGATION: LUNAR AIR FILTRATION WITH A PERMANENT-MAGNET SYSTEM "
[http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2007/pdf/1654.pdf](http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2007/pdf/1654.pdf)

There are probably many more such ideas published.

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neonbat
"combustion-derived nanoparticles" they mean car exhaust right? airborne
pollutants from burning things. seems like just another reason to get rid of
fire based energy.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
FWIW, particulate matter comes not just from exhaust, but also from road wear
etc. that EVs will actually be worse at (since they're heavier).

I don't recall the split off-hand, but here's a paper that should have some
numbers:

[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1352231013...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1352231013002732)

~~~
audunw
I'm not sure if it has been looked into yet, but once EVs are abundant it
would make sense to look into ways of reducing pollution from road wear. Right
now it's not worth it as much, since pollution from the cars themselves
dominate. But once road wear is the dominant source it'll make sense to look
into it.

Automated cleaning trucks which sweep the road for dust every day maybe? New
materials for roads and tyres?

~~~
Tharkun
New materials might be tricky. Roads are very abundant, and in some places of
the world they're a convenient way of disposing of the leftovers of
incinerated waste.

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awjr
"A Look Into the Dramatic Rise in Alzheimer’s Cases"
[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-j-
hall/alzheimers_b_51789...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-j-
hall/alzheimers_b_5178982.html)

I'm guessing this is a time bomb that will be with us for some time.

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devoply
Well then I guess switching from combustion engines to electric engines will
reduce this contamination. But how much new stuff that uses nano particles for
all sorts of things is going to mess up our bodies and cause other health
problems they will be dealing in the next century if we're still around.

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sogen
Oddly enough this sounds like Stephen King's The Running Man ...

