An artist’s take on the “scary wonder” of nanotechnology.

Nanotubes, one of the wonder materials of the new age of nanotechnology, may carry a health risk similar to that of asbestos, a wonder material of an earlier age that turned into a scourge after decades of use when its fibers were found to cause lung disease, researchers said Tuesday.

A team of researchers reported that injecting nanotubes into the abdomens of mice induced lesions similar to those that appear on the outer lining of the lungs after the inhalation of asbestos…When foreign particles like smoke or dust land in the lungs, cells known as macrophages engulf the particles and clear them away. Some asbestos fibers are too long for the macrophages to handle, resulting in lesions. The researchers hypothesized that nanotubes would cause similar problems if they were long, but not if they were short or tangled into a ball…The mice injected with the short nanotubes or small carbon clumps did not develop disease. Those injected with long nanotubes or asbestos developed lesions on the tissue lining.

Certain types of carbon nanotubes — microscopic graphite cylinders used in a small but growing number of Space Age applications — could pose a cancer risk similar to that of asbestos if inhaled, scientists reported Tuesday. Researchers found that mice injected with nanotubes quickly developed the same biological damage associated with early exposure to asbestos fibers, a known carcinogen. The study showed “the potential to cause harm if these things get into the air and into the lungs,” said coauthor Andrew Maynard, a physicist at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.