Dear Richard,

The following recent review entitled "Toxicity of Engineered Nanoparticles in the Environment " by Melissa A et al. published in Anal Chem. 2013 Mar 19; 85(6): 3036–3049 devotes a section on multicellular aquatic and terrestrial organisms and the delivery pathways of toxic materials:

Abstract:

While nanoparticles occur naturally in the environment and have been intentionally used for centuries, the production and use of engineered nanoparticles has seen a recent spike, which makes environmental release almost certain. Therefore, recent efforts to characterize the toxicity of engineered nanoparticles have focused on the environmental implications, including exploration of toxicity to organisms from wide-ranging parts of the ecosystem food webs. Herein, we summarize the current understanding of toxicity of engineered nanoparticles to representatives of various trophic levels, including bacteria, plants, and multicellular aquatic/terrestrial organisms, to highlight important challenges within the field of econanotoxicity, challenges that analytical chemists are expertly poised to address.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4104669/

Hoping this will be helpful,

Rafik

Thank you for this. It's got some useful references. If anyone knows of any more mechanistic studies looking at the transport pathways of nanoparticles into aquatic species, especially at a membrane or cellular level then please feel free to add them to this question. Thanks again