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POTENTIAL REVOLUTIONS/
NANOTECHNOLOGIES
source: www.mod.uk/linked_files/
jdcc/st/4_ScienceTechnology.pdf
www.environmentaldefense.org/
documents/4442_100milquestionl.pdf
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Observers and scientists alike accept that developments in nanotechnology could have enormous impacts on many aspects of social and business life, with wide possibilities… - nanotechnology is simply the ability to do things – measure, see, predict and make – on the scale of atoms and molecules. The nanotech realm is defined as being between 0.1 and 100 nanometres (a nanometre being one-billionth of a metre). Nanotechnology is really an amalgam across the traditional disciplines of biology, physics, engineering, maths and chemistry. Applications using nanoparticles, which are significantly stronger than traditional materials, have already made an impact in the
car and packaging industries;
- global government spending on nanotechnology over 2000-2001 is estimated at US$2 billion. The USA’s National Science Foundation predicts that the total market for nanotech products and services could reach US$1 trillion by 2015; (1)
- the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is spending in this field around US$120 million per annum. Other nations, including Japan, Russia, China, Switzerland, Canada and Israel all have robust technology programmes. The value of continental European research is estimated at US$150 million per annum;
- the major driver behind nanotechnology is currently the civil market. The consensus being that the IT and entertainment industries, preceded by venture capitalists, will continue to provide the impetus for smaller and faster goods (for example: the replacement for portable CD players could be a device fitted in the ear; and the increasing demand for low cost satellites). Medical applications will likely be slower due to costs and safety concerns;
- a parallel interest in nanotechnology is directed towards more sophisticated and vastly more powerful versions of microtechnology products. Extensions of microtechnology into nanotechnology will lead to sensors detecting at the single molecule level, using ever more powerful computer processing and vastly greater memory. Together these technologies may enable sophisticated information networks that will lead to more effective surveillance, for example for natural resource and pollution monitoring;
- timescales for the commercial applications of nanotechnology are not clear. Nanotechnology has enormous theoretical potential but there is still some way to go before much of the technology becomes commercially mature. According to several experts, it is unlikely that the full exploitation will take place before 2015.
- Environmental Defense has called for the US federal government to dedicate at least US$100 million annually, sustained for a period of at least several years, to research directly related to elucidating the health and environmental risks of nanotechnology. According to the organisation, the limited data now available demonstrate the potential for some nanomaterials to be both persistent and mobile in the environment and in living organisms; to cross the blood-brain barrier; and to be capable of damaging brain, lung and skin tissue;
- the National Nanotechnology Coordination Office (NNCO) estimates that fiscal year 2004 spending for environmental and health implications research stood at only US$8.5 million, less than 1% of the total National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) budget; (2)
- since then, such spending appears to be rising somewhat: requested funding for fiscal year 2006 from federal agencies under the NNI for health and environmental research totals US$38.5 million, just under 4% of the total FY2006 nanotechnology development budget for these agencies of US $1.05 billion; (3)
- while an annual expenditure of $100 million represents an additional significant increase over the current level, - as Environmental Defense argues - it is still a small fraction of the more than US$1 billion now being directed annually towards nanotechnology development through the NNI.
- In Europe, scientists expressed similar concerns. The United Kingdom’s Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineering, in its seminal July 2004 report, “Nanoscience and nanotechnologies: Opportunities and uncertainties”, calls for the UK government to devote £5-6 million (US$9.5-11.3 million) per annum for 10 years just to do its part to develop the methodologies and instrumentation needed to set the stage for actual testing of nanomaterials. (4)
(1) National Science Foundation, ‘Societal implications of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology’, March 2001.
(2) E. Clayton Teague, Responsible Development of Nanotechnology, National Nanotechnology Coordination Office, April 2, 2004, available online at www.technology.gov/OTPolicy/Nano/04/0402_TeagueInfocast.pdf.
(3) National Science and Technology Council, Nanoscale Science, Engineering and Technology Subcommittee of the Committee on Technology, The National Nanotechnology Initiative: Research and Development Leading to a Revolution in Technology and Industry: Supplement to the President’s FY2006 Budget, March 2005, p. 38.
(4) The Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering, Nanoscience and nanotechnologies: Opportunities and uncertainties, London, July 2004, p. 48, available online at www.nanotec.org.uk/finalReport.htm.
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