T1-S3. Hazardous Minerals: from atomic- to meso-scale interactions

Alessandro Croce (alessandro.croce@uniupo.it)
Ruggero Vigliaturo (ruggero.vigliaturo@gmail.com)

Minerals may represent an environmental and human hazard. Particle morphometry, surface features, chemistry, valence states, and the minerals’ ability to act as rare and heavy metal reservoirs determine the possibility of interaction with the environment and living organisms. Moreover, these minerals may act as transporters of other pollutants that may be adsorbed at their surface. It is thus fundamental to fully characterize them to determine potential risks on the environment or human body and to describe the mechanisms that may lead to different malignancies.
This session welcomes studies related to hazardous minerals with particular attention to multi-analytical approaches, the use of new methods characterizing mineral particles, the related toxic effects, and modelling of complex particle populations and surface properties. Contributions treating machine learning and neural-network approaches qualitatively improving analysis and time consumption are especially welcome.