Robert Aitken: Director, the SAFENANO Initiative
Rob Aitken is Director of Strategic Consulting at the Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM) in Edinburgh. He was formerly Director of Research Development at IOM, a position he held for six years from 2000 till 2006. He is a founding partner and the co-ordinator of SnIRC, the Safety of Nanomaterials Interdisciplinary Research Centre. He is also an Honorary Teaching Fellow at Napier University, Edinburgh, and an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Nanotechnology as well as a member of their Advisory Board.
In the last five years Rob has been particularly active in nanotechnology risk issues and has contributed four major reviews in this area commissioned by the UK government as part of their response to the 2004 RS/RAE Report 'Nanotechnologies and Nanosciences: Opportunities and Uncertainties', as well as a number of international reviews. He is a member of two UK Government Task Forces (On Exposure and Measurement) which are prioritising nanotechnology risk research needs. He is the Principal UK Expert to ISO 299 WG3: 'Nanotechnologies: Safety, Health and Environment', is a member of FP7 Nanotechnologies Program Expert Advisory Group, and was lead scientist within the Refnano project, which aimed to establish reference materials for Nanotechnology Applications.
As Director of Strategic Consulting for IOM, Rob drives the institute's nanotechnology theme, and is involved in management on a number of European FP7 projects and other nationally funded pieced of work. Included in these are FP7 projects ObservatoryNANO, ENRPA, ENRHES, NANEX and NanoImpactNet. Collectively, he has contributed more than 100 scientific reports, papers and articles on particle risk issues over a period of 25 years.
Bryony L Ross: Editor, the SAFENANO initiative
Bryony Ross is a Research Scientist at the Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM) in Edinburgh. After graduating from Edinburgh University in 2005 with a BSc Hons Physiology, she took a year out before joining the IOM in October 2006.
Since then, she has been heavily involved with the development of SAFENANO and was appointed editor of the initiative in early 2007. Bryony works on a variety of IOM's nanotechnology E,H&S projects, including EU FP7 projects ObservatoryNANO, NanoTEST, NanoImpactNet ENPRA, ENRHES & Nanommune. She is also involved with a variety of other work within the Institute from Occupational Exposure Level setting for Hazardous Substances to collating evidence for Expert Witness cases, and is in the process of completing postgraduate studies in Toxicology.
Bryony has recently completed work on a , and was co-author of several reports published in 2009, including:
A DEFRA report into Nanotechnology and Food,
'HARN' - examining risks of high aspect nanomaterials,
'CELL PEN' - examining penetration & translocation of NPs through cells within the body,
'EMERGNANO' - investigating & appraising the state of the art in nano EHS Research worldwide, and
'ENRHES' - a review of health & environmental safety on four types of engineered nanomaterials (due for publication early 2010)
Sheona AK Peters: Associate Editor, the SAFENANO initiative
Sheona Peters is a Research Scientist at the Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM) in Edinburgh. Prior to joining the IOM, Sheona studied for a Masters in Chemistry at the University of Edinburgh. As part of her degree, Sheona undertook a one year industrial placement with an international pharmaceutical company and completed an independent laboratory research project in Natural Product Synthesis.
Since joining IOM, Sheona has been involved in a range of nanotechnology health & safety consultancy, including assisting with the continued development of SAFENANO for which she is now the Associate Editor. She has recently completed work on EU FP7 project ENRHES (Engineered Nanoparticles – Review of Health & Environmental Safety), and is currently involved in a DEFRA project to review the risks posed to drinking water by man-made nanoparticles and the upcoming FP7 NANEX project.
In addition to nanotechnology-focussed work, Sheona is also involved with a variety of other work within the IOM, including REACH consultancy, chemical risk assessment and the development of a database of international occupational exposure limits. Sheona has also played a key role in an EC-funded project to aid streamlining of the European environmental asbestos Directive, as well as contributing to various expert witness contracts and coordinating the IOM’s international proficiency testing scheme 'AFRICA'.
Steve Hankin - Director of Operations
Steve Hankin is SAFENANO's Director of Operations and is a senior consultant in chemical risk issues at the Institute of Occupational Medicine, Edinburgh.
After acquiring his BSc and PhD degrees in Chemistry, Steve was awarded a National Science & Engineering Research Council Visiting Fellowship which he held with the Femtosecond Science Group at the National Research Council of Canada’s Steacie Institute for Molecular Sciences. He returned to the UK following the award of a NERC post-doctoral fellowship held at the University of Glasgow, continue research on state-of-the-art laser analysis of chemicals on atmospheric particles. In 1999, Steve took up a position as a Research Scientist in the Environmental Health section of Health Protection Scotland (formerly the Scottish Centre for Infection and Environmental Health – SCIEH). He trained further in Medical Toxicology and Epidemiology and led a number of public health toxicology initiatives associated with the surveillance, control and response to hazardous materials exposures. In 2007, he moved to the Institute of Occupational Medicine where his responsibilities included the development and provision of risk assessment and chemical toxicology expertise for a range of industry and government clients associated with the European Union’s REACH regulation and IOM’s nanotoxicology initiative.
In his new role as SAFENANO Director of Operations, Steve will lead the implementation of the SAFENANO open access centre, including the development and roll-out of SAFENANO Scientific Services in occupational hygiene, toxicology, risk assessment and training.
Lang Tran: Expert Consultant, the SAFENANO Initiative
Dr C Lang Tran is Director of Quantitiative Toxicology at the Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM). With over 16 years experience in the fields of toxicology and ecotoxicology, he has contributed over 50 peer reviews.
A researcher at the forefront of particle toxicology, he has been heavily involved in the evolution of Nanoparticle Toxicology as a research field. He currently leads EU FP7 project ENPRA and EU FP6 project PARTICLE_RISK, both of which are investigating the toxicological properties of nanoparticles, and is also involved with FP7 projects NanoTEST, Nanommune and NanoImpactNet. He is a founding member of SnIRC, the Safety of Nanomaterials Interdisciplinary Research Centre.
Dr Tran has been involved in the writing of several major Government reviews of nanotechnology, including reports from DEFRA and HSE. He is involved in collaborative work into nanotoxicology QSAR Modelling with the JRC, and with NIOSH on Nanotechnology Risk Assessment, and was co-author of the HARN and CELL PEN reports, examining risks of high aspect nanomaterials (HARN), and penetration & translocation of NPs through cells within the body (CELL PEN).
Peter Ritchie: System Design and Management, the SAFENANO Initiative
Peter is Head of Information Systems Section at the IOM, in charge of a team that manages all ICT systems, services and strategy. He is responsible for the technical design and development of the SAFENANO website and databases, involving the latest active server technology, and exploitintg the best of recent interactive and community based web features on the site.
Besides the SAFENANO project itself and scientific interests in nanotechnology health, safety and environment, he is also involved in several other research projects, systems, and application developments. With a scientific background in biology and ecology he worked for several years on environmental research projects before moving further into the development of IT systems for the conduct and analysis of large scale educational and medical studies.
At the IOM he has led or contributed to many research projects including the development of database and software applications for epidemiological and occupational health studies, as well as the implementation of chemical, pesticide, fibre and particle exposure data management systems for risk, hazard assessment and reduction.