[extropy-chat] NATURE: Nanoparticles enter the brain

[Extropian Agroforestry Ventures Inc.]

Gives more credibility to the old  practice  of aromatherapy....
Intranasal insulin and flue vaccines may poke up past the radar as well.
With such a myriad of scents from perfumes to weed sprays to "new car smell",
almost everthing with a relatively small molecule has a confirmed direct   neuro
delivery pathway to examine.
Morris J

Russell Evermore wrote:

> This one piqued my interest, but some aspects of the article did tend to peg
> the needle on my bogosity filter.
>
>                                           > from the article --------------
> Günter Oberdörster of the University of Rochester in New York and colleagues
> tracked the progress of carbon particles that were only 35 nanometres in
> diameter and had been inhaled by rats.
>                                            --------------<
>
> In this age of information it seems quite reasonable that I should be a few
> short clicks from answers to questions like: What kinds of carbon particles
> were used - quantum dots, fullerenes, fullerites, fullerides, endohedral,
> exohedral? What concentrations were the rats exposed to? Were these
> particles confined solely to the olfactory parts of the rats brains? Were
> particles of sizes other than 35nm tested?  and were these other sizes
> successfully blocked by the BBB?
>
> Instead, even after digging dilligently, these answers and the purported
> study remained frustratingly elusive.
>
>                                           > from the article-------------
> "These are the first data to show this," says Ken Donaldson, a toxicologist
> at the University of Edinburgh, UK. "I would never have thought of looking
> for inhaled nanoparticles in the brain."
>                                             ------------<
>
> hmmm,  so why then does a quick google of  "nanoparticles" deliver as the
> very first hit:  http://www.nanopharm.de/
>
> Researchers at the University of Magdeburg have developed a nanoparticle
> technology for the targeting of drugs to the central nervous system (CNS).
> Nanoparticles, a drug delivery system to pass the Blood Brain Barrier.
>
>             Advantages over other methods:
>                 (1) no opening of the blood-brain barrier required,
>                 (2) potentially any drug can be delivered (hydrophilic or
> hydrophobic),
>                 (3) the drug does not need to be modified.
>
> None of this is to say I would casually stick my nose into a beaker-full of
> the stuff,  but note the article does clearly state that "people in cities
> take in about 25 million nanoparticles with every breath." That would seem
> to me to be strong anecdotal evidence for nanoparticles being somewhat
> benign. Additionally, I have read a number of articles that strongly
> indicate they may even be beneficial.
>
> RE
> nanowave at shaw.ca
>
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