Toxicity of the Zinc Oxide and Vermiculite/Zinc Oxide Nanomaterials

Nanomaterials and nanocomposite materials on the base of zinc oxide (ZnO) are being produced and applied in our daily life at a rapid pace mainly as additives to the different polymer materials. The antibacterial behaviors of ZnO nanoparticles are intensively studied but related health and environmental toxicity assessments are lagging behind. The aim of this work was evaluated the toxic effect of self-synthesized samples (ZnO nanoparticles, vermiculite/ZnO nanocomposite) and one commercial sample of the ZnO nanoparticles, to induce oxidative stress via lipid peroxidation. This ability is one of the indicators of material toxicity. The toxicity results were compared with the results of titanium dioxide nanoparticles as a validated toxic standard. The effect of the major nanoparticles properties as particle and crystallite size, shape, specific phase and composition were evaluated using the dynamic laser diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction analysis. The attention was also focused on the influence of the vermiculite (as matrix of nanocomposite samples) and temperature of the nanostructured materials preparation. All samples containing vermiculite are not able to induce peroxidation of lipids in comparison to TiO₂ nanoparticles. However, samples of ZnO nanoparticles demonstrate the ability to induce oxidative stress via lipid peroxidation, which decreases with the increasing temperature of preparation and for commercial ZnO was higher than for prepared ZnO nanoparticles.