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posted by Fnord666 on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:58PM   Printer-friendly
from the who-could-have-guessed? dept.

Printer toner linked to genetic changes, health risks in new study:

Getting printer toner on your hands is annoying. Getting it in your lungs may be dangerous.

According to a new study by West Virginia University researcher Nancy Lan Guo, the microscopic toner nanoparticles that waft from laser printers may change our genetic and metabolic profiles in ways that make disease more likely. Her findings appear in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences.

"The changes are very significant from day one," said Guo, a professor in the School of Public Health and member of the Cancer Institute.

[...] "In particular, there is one group I really think should know about this: pregnant women. Because once a lot of these genes are changed, they get passed on through the generations. It's not just you."

On the same days that the researchers assessed the rats' genes, they also measured every metabolite available in their blood.

[...] The metabolic levels that the researchers detected reinforced their other findings. The same health risks that the genetic profiles pointed to were implicated by the metabolic profiles as well.

Building on these results, Guo and her colleagues have since investigated the genomic changes that Singaporean printing company workers have experienced. In many respects, the workers' genomes changed the same ways the rats' genomes did. The results from these workers are included in a manuscript ready for submission to a journal.

"And they're very young," Guo said. "A lot of the workers ranged from 20 to their early 30s, and you're already starting to see all of these changes.

"We have to work, right? Who doesn't have a printer nowadays, either at home or at the office? But now, if I have a lot to print, I don't use the printer in my office. I print it in the hallway."

Nancy Lan Guo, et. al. Integrated Transcriptomics, Metabolomics, and Lipidomics Profiling in Rat Lung, Blood, and Serum for Assessment of Laser Printer-Emitted Nanoparticle Inhalation Exposure-Induced Disease Risks. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 2019; 20 (24): 6348 DOI: 10.3390/ijms20246348


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:22AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:22AM (#965332)

    I tried going through the Wikipedia article on this and there is a citation

      "Laut Studie kann Tonerstaub Krebs verursachen" [Toner dust can cause cancer, according to study]. Berliner Morgenpost (in German). Retrieved 2017-08-06.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toner [wikipedia.org]

    I tried reading the linked article but it's in German.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:32AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @05:32AM (#965338)

    From the above Wikipedia article

    "Health risks

    Muhle et al. (1991) reported that the responses to chronically inhaled copying toner, a plastic dust pigmented with carbon black, titanium dioxide and silica, were also similar qualitatively to titanium dioxide and diesel exhaust.[9]

    Carbon black, one of the components of toner, is classified as "possibly carcinogenic" (Group 2B) by the IARC."

    From the Wikipedia article on Carbon black

    "Carcinogenicity

    Carbon black is considered possibly carcinogenic to humans and classified as a Group 2B carcinogen because there is sufficient evidence in experimental animals with inadequate evidence in human epidemiological studies.[4]"

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_black [wikipedia.org]

    Worth reading the rest of the articles as well (I'm not going to copy and paste all of it though).

  • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday March 02 2020, @08:23AM

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday March 02 2020, @08:23AM (#965399) Journal

    DeepL does a decent job in translating that article:

    Health

    A study by the University of Rostock leaves no doubt: microscopically small particles from toner cartridges are just as carcinogenic as asbestos, soot from cigarettes or from diesel exhaust fumes. Researchers have been observing lung problems and even disability among service technicians of printer manufacturers for years.
    23.10.2008, 13:44

    The dust from toner cartridges in laser printers and copiers can cause lung cancer, according to a scientific study at the University of Rostock. A researcher proved in her doctorate that asbestos fibres and various types of carbon particles produce dangerous oxygen and nitrogen radicals that can lead to cell death, the university in the Hanseatic city of Mecklenburg announced.

    According to the study, service technicians of printer and copier manufacturers have been experiencing increasing lung problems, including incapacity to work and disability, for several years. Some people developed an allergy to toner powder. For example, they lose their voice as soon as they enter rooms where printers or copiers are located, as Jonas said.

    In the lungs of a deceased service technician, who had been in daily contact with toner dust, the electron microscope clearly showed large numbers of carbon particles. The fact that these particles produce dangerous so-called oxygen and nitrogen radicals that can lead to cell death was experimentally investigated by a doctoral student.

    If some copiers and printers exceeded the fine dust limits for streets up to five times, then such limits would also have to be set for workrooms, demanded Professor Ludwig Jonas of the Rostock Institute of Pathology. This, in turn, would require a significant reduction in fine dust pollution in terms of occupational health and safety.
    ( ddp/epd/oc )

    Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

    --
    The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.