Importance of NBI

About the NBI Knowledgebase

The NBI will fill important gaps in our understanding of the risks associated with nanomaterial exposure by defining the relationships between nanomaterial physicochemical properties and the biological responses to their exposure. Such structure-activity relationships will provide regulators with an unbiased interpretation of the scientific information necessary to support regulations that protect human health and the environment. This will, in turn, provide developers the knowledge to direct the development of safer nanomaterials and nanotechnologies while also providing academia with a deeper understanding of nanomaterials as novel modifiers of biological processes.

Information currently being gained in the emerging field of nanotechnology is extremely diverse including a multitude of widely varying nanomaterials that are being or will be tested in a broad array of animal systems and in vitro assays. Knowledge of nanomaterial-biological interactions will likely only be arrived at upon inclusion and consideration of the entire body of data produced from global efforts in this research area. Compilation of this data will allow for the definition of nanomaterial structure-activity relationships. Such mathematical representations can be used to predict nanomaterial properties in the absence of empirical data.