'Smog-eating' material breaking into the big time (BBC) {TiO2}

[eppur_se_muova]

By Jason Palmer
Science and technology reporter, BBC News

What material can you find in toothpaste, sunscreen, solar cells, on the baseline at Wimbledon, in a Roman church, and along a tunnel in Brussels?

Full marks if you guessed titanium dioxide, a nearly ubiquitous but wholly unsung material.

Its brilliant white has made it a staple in pigments - hence Wimbledon - but its eco-credentials are still coming to the fore.

Titanium dioxide does a couple of clever tricks that mean we may well be seeing a lot of it in the future: it's self-cleaning, and it breaks down pollutants in the air.

And the fact that thin films of it are clear is the reason that a number of manufacturers use it in glass applications such as skylights.
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more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15694973

[Duer 157099]

1. Law of unintended consequences on the horizon?

If they go ahead with this, next they'll have to figure out a way to overproduce anti-oxidants to counter all those free radicals. It may only turn out to be a very localized issue, but I'm thinking I wouldn't want to spend a lot of time in close proximity to free-radical producing things. :shrug:

[eppur_se_muova]

2. Most unlikely. These free radicals are generated in the presence of O2, ...

with which they react very rapidly. O2 (which is a diradical) can generate free radicals from hydrocarbons etc., but it also destroys them very effectively, when present in excess.

Radicals within the body/cell cause damage when O2 creates a radical which escapes reaction with further O2, and so goes on to react with nucleic acids or enzymes. Radicals surrounded by O2 in air are extremely unlikely to escape very far.