Development of force and electron microscopy for the quantification of nanoparticle number concentration measurements

The development of metrological and analytical methods for the detection and quantification of nanomaterials (NMs) has been identified as one of the most urgent and important research priorities to advance nanotechnology. Several nanometrics such as mass, number and surface area are currently under scrutiny by nanotechnologists in order to identify the most appropriate metrics to express the hazard of NMs and therefore to perform risk assessments. Currently, NM mass concentration is almost universally used as a metric because of challenges with analytical measurements, while the mass concentration is measured by a analytical technique called inductive coupled plasma mass spectroscopy. For example, the mass concentration doesn't facilitate to quantify the NM aggregation but can be quantified by particle number measurement. The particle number concentration is an important metric in nanotechnology. However tools/methods capable of providing fully quantitative assessment of the number size distribution and number particle concentration are lacking and are urgently needed