From the Australian Broadcasting Corp's The Future is Small: "A pair of nanopants, long-lasting lipstick or self-cleaning windows won't change the world. But physicist and nanotechnology expert Professor Mick Wilson, Dean of Science at the University of Western Sydney, argues that new products and new ways of making them will bring profound social and economic change…Wilson said that with Drexler's vision of nanotech, as a sort of Meccano or Lego set of about 90 atoms, you could build anything you wanted want from the bottom up. 'As Drexler says, there's no pollution, because you don't make anything that you don't want, you just [take] every atom that you want out of the box and use it,' said Wilson." Prof. Wilson is coauthor of the book Nanotechnology: Basic Science and Emerging Technologies, reviewed as an "excellent comprehensive introduction."

Elaine Tschorn and Judy Conner at Foresight bring to our attention this report from Campus Germany: "Currently, more than half of Europeís nanotechnology companies are from Germany and of all the patent applications from across the world, German researchers are only beaten by the Americans in terms of quantity…In total, the Government spends around 300 million euros a year on nanotechnology, a figure which, relatively, is higher than that in the USA."

Judy Conner, Foresight's Public Service Communications Manager, brings this UPI story by Charles Choi to our attention: Nano World: Edible nanotech on the horizon, based on work by physicist Anthony Dinsmore at U Mass Amherst. "We're creating nanoparticles that can assemble themselves and made of materials already found in foods. We're not doing any exotic chemistry," Dinsmore said [with refreshing modesty --CP] of his group's work…"The big issue for new applications in food is that the cost always has to be really low — so that excludes robots." Quite so — when we develop nanoscale robotic devices, we'll have better things to do with them than digestion.–CP

Helmut Kaiser, a consultancy based in Germany, has bravely published a study on Nanotechnology in Food and Food Processing Industry Worldwide 2003-2006-2010-2015: "Tomorrow we will design food by shaping molecules and atoms…Molecular technologies are disruptive technologies and change the conventional production faster than most scientists expect. It can make the products cheaper, the production more efficient, more safe and more sustainable using less water and chemicals. Producing less waste and using less energy. The impact for the food industry will be a change of 40 to 60 percent by 2015. The change is dramatic, the potentials are immense and the risks too." The report costs 6900 euros, and we'll be happy to review it if they'll send us a free copy.

For techies — Unless you read Pure Appl. Chem. consistently, you may have missed this paper (pdf): Toward replicatable, multifunctional, nanoscaffolded machines. A chemical manifesto from chemists in Germany. "If one, however, views such constructs as three-dimensionally defined noncovalent nanoscaffolding of a multitude of modular functions whose array is replicatable in a nonautonomous way, many pieces of technology needed for their implementation became recently available." They propose "a scheme for the implementation of a prototype generation of replicatable nanomachines." Read More for a summary of the scheme.

Two molecular mechanisms from the book Nanosystems have been animated by Gina Miller: a rotary sorter and a molecule binding and orienting mechanism. Such graphics are highly useful for communicating molecular machine concepts to both technical and non-technical audiences. Great job, Gina!

From politics.co.uk: "UK Science Minister Lord Sainsbury was responding to a year-long nanotech study conducted by the Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineering, which recommended precaution and regulation of the controversial industry…Lord Sainsbury pledged a review of current safety regulations to ensure the safeguarding of people's health and the environment, and announced a new cross-government group to co-ordinate all aspects of research into nanoscience to underpin safety assessments." This does not sound much like what one activist group had hoped for (see Read More below). UPDATE: Here's the BBC view.

SciDev.net has a piece by Catherine Brahic and David Dickson titled Helping the poor: the real challenge of nanotech: "But there is also the danger that, if such concerns are taken too far, they could block the development of technological innovations that offer a genuine opportunity ó even taking their potential threats and limitations into account ó to substantially increase the health and well-being of those across the developing world. Such is the case with nanotechnology, the manipulation of atoms and molecules to create new materials and processes at the 'nanoscale'." Indeed–CP

Those of you trying to track what is going on in nanotech in Asia should visit our friends over at Asian Technology Information Program and monitor their Nano News page, which has some of their nano reports posted free, including Soft Nanomachine Science: "Although there are many unknown factors, it is possible to design a simple soft nanomachine. However, applications for soft nanomachines have not been developed and the technology is still at a very basic research stage." If you can justify it economically, get a subscription and read them all.

NanoMarkets, a Virginia-based analyst firm, offers free white papers on nanotech application areas (registration required). You can also participate in their web surveys and see survey results. If you have a hefty budget, check out their market reports. We like their slogan: "quantifying the disruptive power of nanotechnology."

Nanopolis writes "Would you like to have your company presentation included in the first and only multimedia encyclopedia on nanotech? (see an example: http://www.nanopolis.net/article.php?cid=510 ) with your technology explained in a few seconds? (see an example: http://www.nantero.com/nram.html )

Then, you shouldnít miss the ìExploring Nanotechnologyî Encyclopedia & Virtual Show Case expected for world-wide release in May.

For more details about our initiative and your benefits, please refer to http://www.nanopolis.net/ind_index.php.

Looking forward to hearing from you,
Christian Norman
Chief Editor
Nanopolis encyclopedia series"

The first U.S. Nanosystems Engineering degree program has been announced, and not perhaps where one would expect it: "The Louisiana Board of Regents granted final approval Thursday for Louisiana Tech to offer the nanosystems engineering degree program, the first such program in the nation." It sounds as though the mechanical engineers had a hand in this, which is encouraging.
But as an MIT alum, where nanosystems work first started back in the late '70s, I am disappointed that the Institute of Technology doing this starts with an L instead of an M. Must the future of nanotech be in Ruston instead of Cambridge?

Readers interested in how nanomedicine and related products will be regulated may want to explore the new US Food and Drug Administration nanotechnology website, which includes "FDA Regulation of Nanotechnology Products" and six Powerpoint presentations (also posted as html). They've borrowed their nanotech definition from NSF's, which requires a length scale of 1-100 nanometers, and at the same time, controlling or manipulating on the "atomic" scale. Which is it: up to 100 nm, or atomic? This NSF definition has never made sense to me. (The agencies' actual behavior seems to use the 1-100 nm version.)–CP

Deloitte, a leading consultancy, has released TMT Trends: Predictions 2005 (overview or full pdf): "The capacity to manufacture economically products, components and materials on an atom-by-atom basis will lift many industries to the next level–with nanotechnology quickly becoming synonymous with superior products…Nothing, it seems, will escape the influence of nanotechnology."

For the techies: If you could use some orientation on how energy can be supplied to molecular nanosystems, see this plenary lecture presented at the International Conference on Physical Organic Chemistry, titled Light-powered molecular-scale machines, published in Pure Appl. Chem.: "The most convenient way to supply energy to a molecular machine is through photochemical energy inputs."

Roland Piquepaille writes "BusinessWeek Online is publishing today a technology special report, Inside Nanotech. Here are the contents.

• Slugfest in the Nanotech Trenches
  Competitors in this young field, fearful of being elbowed aside, are going all out to establish themselves as the leaders. With the stakes so high, it's no wonder
• High IPO Hurdles for Nanotechs
  It's not easy for them to go public these days, especially for the broader "nano-platform" companies. Their time may be coming, however
• The Worries over Nano No-Nos
  Could the same properties that make the tiny particles so effective also turn them into efficient troublemakers inside the human body?
• Oklahoma: Nanotech Hotbed?
  Yep, along with Cleveland, Albany, and other areas way off tech's beaten coastal paths. This time, the geographic field is wide open
• A Nanotech Pioneer's Sober Assessment
  Goundbreaking researcher Stan Williams of HP says it's clear that "the 'knee' in the curve is still another five or more years away"

Ed. Note… The pages will load faster if you disable Javascript…

If you haven't already run across AZoNano, give the site a look. A collaboration of AZoM in Australia and IoN in Scotland, the site aims "to become the primary Nanotechnology information source for the science, engineering and design community worldwide." That's an ambitious goal, but in any case, it's a useful site and completely free of charge.

The Feb. 22 New York Times has an article by Kenneth Chang giving an overview of nanoparticle progress: "Shrinking some medicines to nanoparticle size could improve effectiveness… Greater surface area also makes nanoparticles well suited for certain types of environmental cleanup…But nanoparticles may have potential dangers that are still not well understood."

Adam Keiper brings our attention to this story by Neil Munro in National Journal, a highly influential DC publication, about the recent National Academy meeting looking at molecular manufacturing: "In response, the nanotechnologists have essentially split into two camps: One faction wants to preserve federal support for such research by downplaying the technology by calling it evolutionary; the other embraces nanotechnology as revolutionary and urges a full-scale advocacy campaign to sell the public on the beneficial possibilities of the technology…This would involve developing machines that, at the molecular level, would make other machines. These machines are not in the immediate offing — although nanotechnologists agree this is the goal of nanotechnology — but such machines do offer the prospect of building a wide range of objects inexpensively and with atomic precision." Thanks, Adam!

The February 2005 issue of NanoNews Now focuses on molecular nanotechnology, including interviews with Scott Mize of Foresight, Mike Treder and Chris Phoenix of CRN, and Doug Parr of Greenpeace — see excerpts on their homepage. Also includes Foresight Senior Associate Pearl Chin's column on nanotech investing. Single issues are $19.95, but you can view the current issue at no charge by signing up for their free email newsletter, NanoNews Digest (click on "Your Account" on the thank you page to set up an account). Or, get a 90-day free trial by subscribing to NanoNews Now itself.