Sporn Thomas A
Department of Pathology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, USA.
Recent Results Cancer Res. 2011;189:1-11. doi: 10.1007/978-3-642-10862-4_1.
The term asbestos collectively refers to a group of naturally occurring fibrous minerals which have been exploited in numerous commercial and industrial settings and applications dating to antiquity. Its myriad uses as a "miracle mineral" owe to its remarkable properties of extreme resistance to thermal and chemical breakdown, tensile strength, and fibrous habit which allows it to be spun and woven into textiles. Abundant in nature, it has been mined considerably, and in all continents save Antarctica. The nomenclature concerning asbestos and its related species is complex, owing to the interest held therein by scientific disciplines such as geology, mineralogy and medicine, as well as legal and regulatory authorities. As fibrous silicates, asbestos minerals are broadly classified into the serpentine (chrysotile) and amphibole (crocidolite, amosite, tremolite, anthophyllite, actinolite) groups, both of which may also contain allied but nonfibrous forms of similar or even identical chemical composition, nonpathogenic to humans. Recently, fibrous amphiboles, not historically classified or regulated as asbestos (winchite, richterite), have been implicated in the causation of serious disease due to their profusion as natural contaminants of vermiculite, a commercially useful and nonfibrous silicate mineral. Although generally grouped, classified, and regulated collectively as asbestos, the serpentine and amphibole groups have different geologic occurrences and, more importantly, significant differences in crystalline structures and chemical compositions. These in turn impart differences in fiber structure and dimension, as well as biopersistence, leading to marked differences in relative potency for causing disease in humans for the group of minerals known as asbestos.
石棉一词统称一组天然存在的纤维状矿物，自古代起便在众多商业和工业环境及应用中得到开发利用。它作为一种“神奇矿物”有多种用途，这归因于其卓越的性能，即对热和化学分解具有极强的抵抗力、抗拉强度，以及其纤维习性使其能够被纺成纱线并织成织物。石棉在自然界中储量丰富，已在除南极洲以外的各大洲大量开采。由于地质学、矿物学和医学等科学学科以及法律和监管当局对其感兴趣，关于石棉及其相关种类的命名很复杂。作为纤维状硅酸盐，石棉矿物大致分为蛇纹石（温石棉）和闪石（青石棉、铁石棉、透闪石、直闪石、阳起石）两类，这两类还可能包含化学组成相似甚至相同的 allied 但非纤维状形式，对人类无致病性。最近，纤维状闪石（历史上未被归类或监管为石棉，如锌铁闪石、钠闪石）因其作为蛭石（一种商业上有用的非纤维状硅酸盐矿物）的天然污染物大量存在，被认为与严重疾病的发生有关。尽管通常作为石棉统一归类、分类和监管，但蛇纹石和闪石两类有不同的地质成因，更重要的是，它们在晶体结构和化学组成上有显著差异。这些差异进而导致纤维结构和尺寸以及生物持久性的不同，使得被称为石棉的这组矿物在导致人类疾病的相对效力上有显著差异。
