German armed forces warn that carbon fiber might be cancer-causing | Hacker News Reader

German armed forces warn that carbon fiber might be cancer-causing

ndr.de

101 pointsm8rl55 comments

Since the carcinogenic effect of asbestos is mostly caused by it's physical properties[1]; anything that resembles the shape of asbestos' micro-particles is also highly suspected to be carcinogenic.

The shape, size, and adsorbing nature of the fibers also appear to be critically important. Recently, doubts have arisen concerning the safety of commercially available carbon nanotubes,[2] which may possess the same carcinogenicity as asbestos fibers because of their similar characteristics. Ample care has to be taken to prevent a tragedy similar to the one caused by asbestos exposure.[1]

[1] http://www.med.nagoya-u.ac.jp/medlib/nagoya_j_med_sci/7112/p... [PDF]

[2] http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/v3/n7/abs/nnano.2008.111...

On making nanotubes less dangerous: Shorter is better http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/anie.201207664/ab...

It's probably worth making the distinction that most people are exposed to "Carbon Fiber" as CRP[1], not "raw carbon fibers". And it is the ~aersolized bits raw carbon/dusts (the subject of this article) that are problematic.

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[1] The german title is "Bundeswehr warnt vor Krebs durch Carbonfasern", and From the German wikipedia page "Carbonfasern" ...

The fibers are mainly for the production of carbon fiber reinforced plastic used (CFRP = Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic). Derived from the English, the abbreviation CFRP (is english Carbon Fibre Reinforced Plastic) used.

Much like asbestos siding in that regard, where its not exactly being pumped into the air by most people, but people who work with it, for example sanding it, create a health hazard.

And indeed one way of making existing asbestos building materials safe (or at least, safer) is by spraying plastic on them to encapsulate them.

In another life I had to take aircraft crash response training, and was in charge of recovery (salvage, battle-field repair etc). The response to an aircraft with composite materials is totally different. With normal construction we could get to work as soon as the fire, was out and any hazardous liquids were taken care of. Crashes involving damage to composite structures required that the damaged areas be sprayed down with a varnish like chemical by the same troops who handle Chemical weapon response (they had special suits). Then there would be air particulate tests before we could move in. Here is a military study: http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a420193.pdf

A long time ago a coworker told me about this. He told me it was because the dust was conductive and would wreck havoc with electronics.

I've heard an anecdote along these lines, too. It was about a lathe that had been exposed to carbon-fiber dust starting to turn when supposedly off.

There's all kinds of nasty stuff in and around aerospace / military wrecks. It always boggles my mind when I see kids playing on wrecked equipment. DU aerosols, hydrazine, CF aerosols, and who knows what else.

Formula 1 and other open wheel racing drivers have been exposed to carbon fiber dust (from the carbon-carbon brakes) for a few decades now. There is some research going on with former racing drivers.

E.g. former F1 driver Mika Salo underwent surgery where his lungs were examined to assess the effects of repeated exposure to burned carbon fiber dust (this was several years ago). Unfortunately, I do not have any links to sources nor do I know the results of the research.

Another big question mark is the health and environmental effects of graphene. There is a lot of research going on in applications of graphene but only now there have been research projects into possible negative effects on the environment.

I remember this. Article link http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/41211...

Here is something: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/formula_one/41211...

Apparently the surgery was unrelated, they found lots of carbon brake dust in his lungs purely by chance. No conclusion on whether it is dangerous or not.

Edit: grahamel was quicker :)

I recall him telling (in a Finnish commentary for a F1 race broadcast) that he went to another surgery to examine the carbon fiber dust in his lungs. But this was almost 10 years ago, I can't remember the specifics.

Can you wash the carbon fiber dust out of the lungs?

Washing air-breathing lungs with water sounds problematic, although with fluro-carbons and the prevalence of lung cancer I am not going to say no-one hasn't tried !

You could wash one lung at a time. Or use extracorporeal membrane oxygenation.

Water in an of itself won't hurt lungs as long as the patient gets enough oxygen.

I imagine you would have to use saline rather than plain water to avoid the lung cells bursting due to osmosis.

"Water in an of itself won't hurt lungs"

Yes it does: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drowning#Secondary_drowning

If you ever get saved from near drowning, you are still not safe.

I guess there is a point that the dust will always be around the car.

But while driving it does not look like the driver would be affected by it: http://www.ozeninc.com/images/hpc-carmesh-2.jpg

They're racing against other cars, cars to the right, cars to the left, cars in front. I don't see what the aerodynamic profile is meant to inform us?

If I were to hazard a guess: the fact that air is directed over and around the driver's compartment would mean that at racing speeds, someone around or in front of your car releasing an aerosol would mean you're unlikely to be exposed to it

I would also assume people working in the cycling industry who've been working with carbon fiber for decades would have the same exposure. The first carbon fiber frame was made in 1975:

http://www.jimlangley.net/ride/bicyclehistorywh.html (its at the bottom of the page in the timeline)

As with all manufacturing processes, I'm pretty sure in 1975, it wasn't nearly as precise or safe it is now and am wondering how many people were exposed to these fumes. If you wanted a good control group, I'd think they would be a prime candidate to examine the effects of this on the lungs.

One minor statistical problem is I googled around for mesothelioma and it looks like when tens of millions are exposed, roughly about thousands die per year, about 20-40 years after exposure. So if you have a population of maybe 1000 total drivers after thirty or so years you'll have maybe one die per year. Or so.

Another problem with the disease is the proverbial 18 year old apprentice steamfitter could die of lung cancer in his relatively young late 40s which is epidemiologically very interesting and easy to detect. There are some young 20-something F-1 drivers who are barely old enough to drink booze, but if a 40 year old driver finally today inhales "the" fiber that would kill him 40 years later, that is rather moot if he dies at 65 of a totally unrelated heart attack or 70 of an unrelated cancer.

So there are two problems: There are not many possible victims resulting in perhaps less than one cancer as a result, and some of the drivers are "really old" by SV programmer standards and the cancer is really slow to kill, so they'll die long before the cancer takes hold.

So... by analogy, if smoking pot will kill me from lung cancer in 30 years, that is rather motivational when told to 10 year olds, but I don't think it'll discourage many new social security recipients from taking up the pipe. In fact that sounds like a fun idea to me.

It won't just be drivers though, anyone in the pits will be exposed to brake dust, maybe even the spectators.

You are correct although it rapidly turns into a square/cube law scaling problem. I have spent many thousands of working hours fifteen miles downwind of a F1 track but the dilution factor is immense. Also time factors in that the track I work downwind of only races once a year but drivers work all year. (although there are minor races all year, which may involve CF material vehicles)

Mechanics specializing in brake work are likely at very high exposure and "should be" dying at a dramatically higher rate than drivers or anyone else. But I haven't heard of anything like that.

A research facility of the german armed forces warns that carbon fiber once burned at high temperatures is transformed to micro-sized particles having effects on the lungs comparable to asbestors.

The USAF was concerned at one point that should an F-16 burn on a runway, it would release carbon-fiber strands which would float around the base and short out electrical equipment (communications gear, phone switch, power generation, etc).

Seems like the concern was correct, but misplaced. We had a plane catch fire on a taxiway and burn, and no electrical mayhem resulted. Perhaps we should have worn our gas masks -- but we didn't know at the time.

Sounds like that they were aware of 'Soft Bomb' technology and were worried that an accidental soft bomb could go off via the F-16's fiber/composite materials burning.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLU-114/B_%22Soft-Bomb%22

Interesting, that a plane from 1988 had warnings and concerns for a bomb that wouldn't be used until 1999. I wonder when the US first had one ready to go. What year was your experience?

1983-85 at Hahn. We were the first base in USAFE to get the F-16 (A & B models).

Now it's a civilian airport where RyanAir tricks people into thinking they're flying into Frankfurt -- an additional 90-minute bus ride away (there's a reason why the airfare is so cheap!)

I'd be more worried about the tank of hydrazine in an F-16.

While in undergrad I spent about 5 years working with carbon fiber in a motorsports setting. I did a lot of cutting and sanding without a mask. There were weeks I would blow my nose 3 days after working on a part and still find black specks. I guess I'll find out in a few years...

According to the article, this is the actually “good” variant: Normally, the dust is getting caught in the nose and does not reach the lungs. However, these fibres break down during a fire at temperatures of 650°C and become much smaller. This smaller size allows them to enter the lungs and potentially cause havoc there.

Put another way, every “black speck” you found did not reach your lungs (although I doubt that this is particularly healthy, either…) :)

From the Google translated version of the article it looks like it's only dangerous when burned.

To be fair, most things are dangerous when burned.

People especially. I get very cross.

But carbon fiber is used in applications where high-friction (burning) is likely to occur... It is harder to burn metal.

And there are levels of dangerous, based on size and shape of microparticles.

> To be fair, most things are dangerous when burned.

That's not at all true. Some things are more, some things are less.

Incompletely burned plastic? More. Full burned? Less. Gasoline? Less. Mercury? More. Arsenic? Less.

I seem to remember hearing that sofas release cyanide when burned.

If I recall correctly, creating carbon fiber involves burning a material. The fibers, even in their raw state, resemble asbestos. The saving grace is that they are typically cast in resin, so to get the asbestos-like fibers back, you have to burn off the resins binding them together.

This is about the ashes, which are smaller and able to get into the system.

I was in the US military in the late 80s and early 90s and we were told then that carbon fiber used in aircraft may be cancer causing. Nothing new here.

Translated highlights:

Carbon fiber once burned at high temperature breaks down sufficiently for it to penetrate mucous membranes. The risk highlighted by the Germans here relates to the ash left over after the fire. i.e. Hinting a potential long term dangers / contamination from the ash floating around.

Note that this article (at least from the translated version) seems to be implying that the risk is around burning or particulate carbon fiber. I would definitely believe that.

The epoxy is also pretty nasty too. If you don't wear the right personal protective equipment when using it, you can quickly become sensitized to it. I don't know what that means medically, but it can't be good. I have always worn the right gear when building things, but it is clearly harmful to you without proper ventilation and separation from your skin.

I love composites, but they definitely have downsides.

Epoxy resin is an algerin which is why you get sensitized to it. You have to be very careful when it is not fully cured, but once cured it is a good plastic. having said that I don't recommend getting exposed to any plastic smoke.

I can confirm this. They say that the dust becomes dangerous above 650°C. The fibers become even smaller and reach the lungs.

I find it interesting that this article was yanked from Hacker News just as quickly as I saw it. I clicked on the link, wanted to go to the discussion and had to find it through search in spite of its high vote count and recent submission.

Hacker News is an English-language site. This is not to disparage content in other languages; it's just what HN is. Posts not in English mostly get demoted, unless they're of major significance and nothing is available in translation.

And next week our great Bundeswehr Research Facility will tell us that: smell of burned oil can make us ill and eating of weapon bullets can cause diarrhea.

Though I'm all in to scientific development and the benefits of these new materials, I still want to point out, that nor carbon-fiber or graphene exist in nature in large quantities for more than one reason, while diamond and graphite do. Now the question should be .. why is that?

Likely because they require complex structures processes to create, not just pressure and time and heat. "Danger to others" is not a factor in nature's selection process.

Danger to others that share a gene line IS part of natural selection. That's why most creatures don't cannibalize within their family/pack for instance.

That's not what the OP was talking about however. The fact that carbon fibers are not present in nature only tells us that we didn't have to evolve anything protecting us from it if it's really dangerous (since it was never a selection criteria). That doesn't mean it's necessarily harmful though.

Disagree; OP was talking about why no animal in nature produces carbon fibre, given its dangerous to others nearby. Was it ecological pressure? I answered, yes that's possible.

Carbon fibers are pretty complex to produce, that alone can explain why they're not naturally present in nature. It would be similar to wondering why silicon microprocessors are not naturally synthesized by nature.

It doesn't necessarily mean that evolution ruled it out, just that it may never have considered it in the first place because it never came to exist under the stochastic process of evolution.

He was contrasting it with diamond and graphite. I don't think animals produce those either. It seems more like the topic was why nature in general does not produce carbon fiber, not animals specifically.

Another argument is on a total mass of carbon basis, diamond and graphite don't exist in nature in large quantities. Most of it is in the form of various boring minerals, coal, CO2, and living material. Refined pyrolytic graphite doesn't exactly wash up on shore and diamonds are very unusual on a tonnage basis.

I'm too lazy to run the exact numbers but its going to work out to something like a trainload of coal per diamond on a total mass of the earth basis.

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