EPA ORD NaKnowBase (NKB): Nanomaterial Database Development for Access and Collaboration
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Engineered nanomaterials (ENM) are being developed for use in a wide variety of consumer and industrial applications. They can exhibit significantly different properties compared to their macro counterparts due to a high surface-area-to-volume ratio, enabling surface properties to dominate over bulk properties. The development and application of these particles is currently outpacing the ability of scientists to test their environmental and human health effects. US EPA has collected its research on nanomaterials into a database, NaKnowBase (NKB), that is currently under development. It is a primary objective of this database to facilitate open science and help fill gaps in understanding of the health impacts of nanomaterials. NKB data focuses primarily on documenting nanomaterial studies including nanomaterial material chemistry. For this data to be useful in exploring the health, environmental, and biological impacts of these nanomaterials, it needs to be easily interoperable with databases that focus on biological and environmental context of materials. The lack of a consistent nomenclature across sources for ENM exacerbates difficulties in efficiently and accurately integrating data from separate data sources. To overcome these barriers EPA ORD has developed a standardized of terminology and data structure system for NKB. Here, we describe recent improvements in consistency and accessibility in Linked Open Data (LOD) formats for NKB, and how these updates facilitate further data integration across sources. This abstract does not reflect EPA Policy.