Comments About the Human Health Risks Related to Additive Manufacturing

Additive Manufacturing processes are establishing themselves in different fields, especially due to the possibility to realize free-form and highly personalized products. Life Cycle Cost and Life Cycle Assessment analyses have been conducted to evaluate the economic and environmental sustainability of AM techniques. However, a consolidated knowledge of the risks for exposures to AM materials (as metallic powders) and of the hazards for fire and dust explosions is still missing. The paper performs an investigation on these aspects focusing on the existing literature and on the standards proposed by different international regulatory organizations. A critical review of the achieved awareness in the domestic and industrial environments is carried out, and the importance of models for the construction of risk indicators is highlighted

Assembly of odour adsorbent nanofilters by incorporating cyclodextrin molecules into electrospun cellulose acetate webs

A significant problem in ventilating domestic or commercial kitchens is the removal and separation of volatile compounds which we perceive as strong smells of the sort particularly emitted whilst frying food. In this research, the feasibility of preparing enriched electrospun cellulose acetate (CA)-based nanofibres containing cone-shaped molecules of beta-cyclodextrin (β-CD) for the adsorption of the very strong and sharp aldehyde odour of hexanal, which is a marker for oil and fat oxidation was investigated. A binary solvent system using acetone: DMF (2:1) was shown to be suitable for solution blending of CA with β-CD. Nanofibrous webs were continuously produced and found to be substantially free of defects such as beading, producing fibres with the average diameters of 773±50 nm in the range: 250–1.5μm. Colorimetry was used to show the entrapment of β-CD in the CA structure. The encapsulation efficiency of β-CD in the fibre structures was typically 85%. FTIR of the electrospun nanofibres examining the fingerprint region of CA indicating no structural changes in the CA during processing. Our results show that electrospun CA fibres embedded with β-CD molecules demonstrate enhanced direct adsorption of model odour material hexanal (up to 80%) indicating feasibility for use in filtration