Comparative risk assessment of activities involving nanomaterials by NanoTool & Guidance methods

Background: Assessing the risks associated with the advancement of science and technologyhas always been accompanied by a great deal of uncertainties. Nanotechnology is a relativelynew field with many uncertainties regarding its safety, health and environmental aspects thathave necessitated risk assessment in this field. Therefore, the present study aimed tocomparatively assess the risk of activities involved with nanomaterials.Material and Methods: The study was conducted at 18 nanotechnology companies in Tehran.To assess the risk of their activities, two proposed methods to assess the risk of activitiesinvolving nanomaterials (NanoTool and Guidance) were used. The results were analyzed bySPSS.22 software using chi-square test.Results: The results showed that although both methods were designed based on the ControlBanding approach, their outputs were different. This is because of different parametersconsidered by them to assess the risk of activities. Also statistical analysis of the results showedno significant relationship between them.Conclusions: Given the large difference and lack of significant association between riskassessment results, Guidance seems to be less effective than NanoTool. But since it is astraightforward method and easy to implement in work and research environments, it can beused in initial evaluations.

Keywords:

Nanomaterials , Risk Assessment , Control Banding , NanoTool Method , Guidance Method