No evidence for cerium dioxide nanoparticle translocation in maize plants.
The rapidly increasing production of engineered nanoparticles has raised questions regarding their environmental impact and their mobility to overcome biological important barriers. Nanoparticles were found to cross different mammalian barriers, which is summarized under the term translocation. The present work investigates the uptake and translocation of cerium dioxide nanoparticles into maize plants as one of the major agricultural crops. Nanoparticles were exposed either as aerosol or as suspension. Our study demonstrates that 50 μg of cerium/g of leaves was either adsorbed or incorporated into maize leaves. This amount could not be removed by a washing step and did not depend on closed or open stomata investigated under dark and light exposure conditions. However, no translocation into newly grown leaves was found when cultivating the maize plants after airborne particle exposure. The use of inductively coupled mass spectrometer allowed detection limits of less than 1 ng of cerium/g of leaf. Exposure of plants to well-characterized nanoparticle suspensions in the irrigation water resulted also in no detectable translocation. These findings may indicate that the biological barriers of plants are more resistant against nanoparticle translocation than mammalian barriers.
Birbaum
Karin
K
Laboratory of Inorganic Chemistry and Institute of Chemical and Bioengineering, ETH Zurich, Wolfgang-Pauli Strasse 10, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland.
Brogioli
Robert
R
Schellenberg
Maya
M
Martinoia
Enrico
E
Stark
Wendelin J
WJ
Günther
Detlef
D
Limbach
Ludwig K
LK
D000327:Adsorption; D000336:Aerosols / Q000378:metabolism; D057914:Agricultural Irrigation; D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000378:metabolism*; D002563:Cerium / Q000378:metabolism*; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D053758:Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry*; D018515:Plant Leaves / Q000378:metabolism / Q000648:ultrastructure; D054046:Plant Stomata / Q000378:metabolism; D003313:Zea mays / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000648:ultrastructure
D000336:Aerosols; D000393:Air Pollutants; D002563:Cerium; C030583:ceric oxide