Category: Media Mentions

from the World-Watch dept.
South Korea needs to encourage investment in new fields of technology to avert a collapse of the country's manufacturing sector, according to comments by Park Sung-rok, a researcher of the Korea Economic Research Institute (KERI) in a discussion of a government development program for the next 10 years. Referring to the government's efforts to foster the four future technologies – information technology, biotechnology, environmental technology and nanotechnology – Park said that of the four, nanotechnology would be the core technology. Pointing out that Korea's investment in these future technologies is less than one tenth that of the United States or Japan, he expressed concerns about Korea's future status in these technological fields. His comments were reported in the Korea Herald ("Expert warns of manufacturing sector collapse", 24 July 2001).
However, another KH report ("Sukgyung AT Co. zooms in on nanotechnology application market", 27 July 2001) shows that private sector firms in South Korean are beginning to move into the field: "Although the government and some companies have just begun to realize the importance of nanotechnology, few Korean firms have jumped into this next-generation technology," said Lim Hyung-sup, CEO of Sukgyung AT Co., a venture startup that produces basic materials used in electronic parts.

The August 2001 issue of Scientific American has an interesting article ("Go Forth and Replicate", by M. Sipper and J. A. Reggia) on machine replication. (Unfortunately, it is not available online). The article describes attempts to develop a general understanding of self-replicating systems, with its roots in the work of John von Neumann, Stanislaw Ulam, and others. The article covers research into cellular automata simulations before moving on to describe more recent work by the authors and others that often employ evolutionary methods, including self-replicating systems that do not include an explicit self-description. They also mention the pioneering 1980 NASA study on complex replicating machine systems led by Robert A. Freitas Jr., now a researcher at Zyvex Corp. and author of Nanomedicine.

The authors, aware of the implications, state: "Researchers in the field of nanotechnology have long proposed that self-replication will be crucial to manufacturing molecular-scale machines . . . Recent advances have given credence to these futuristic-sounding ideas." They add that the study of such systems presents a "twofold challenge of creating replicating machines and avoiding dystopian predictions of devices running amok. The knowledge we gain will help us separate good technologies from destructive ones."

Read more for links to a few items related to nanotechnology and self-replicating systems.

from the "Chicagoland"? dept.
A report issued by the office of Chicago Mayor Richard Daley examines options to help the Chicago region ("Chicagoland" — who thinks these things up?) retain its position as a leading economic center in the United States. The Mayor's Council of Technology Advisors engaged a consulting firm to help develop an economic growth strategy for Chicagoland; the report identifies nanotechnology as a potential growth option, and notes local strengths that would allow the region to develop a leading role in the nanotechnology sector. The report ("A New Economy Growth Strategy for Chicagoland") is available online as an Adobe Acrobat PDF file (about 2.2 MB) at the Chicago Technology Today website.

A commentary on the plan that appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times ("How Chicago can seize the New Economy future", by H. Wolinsky, 19 July 2001) is available on the SmallTimes website.

from the deep-in-the-heart-of-Texas dept.
A profile of Zyvex Corp. appeared in Darwin Magazine ("Small is Beautiful", by Emelie Rutherford, 27 July 2001), focusing on the companyís efforts to develop replicating systems. "It would take forever to produce something that can be seen with the naked eye one molecule at a time," explains Rocky Angelucci, a technical representative at Zyvex, "so these mechanisms will duplicate themselves until there's a big enough array of them to produce building blocks for products." (And, once again, we see another example of the endless inability of the media to verify the correct spelling of the name of Zyvex President and CEO, Jim Von Ehr.)

Von Ehr was also named one of "The Top 25 High Tech Leaders in Dallas" by D Magazine in July.

from the No-more-nano-washing-machines,-please dept.
A leading Chinese nanotechnology researcher has called for a more realistic attitude toward nanotechnology in the face of increasing hype and misdirection about the field, according to a report in the Business Weekly ("Nanotech shrouded in doubt", by Liang Yu, 17 July 2001). Despite being a promising prospect, nanotechnology still has a long way to go in China before it can bring about any fundamental changes to people's lives, cautioned Li Minqian, senior researcher at the Shanghai Institute of Nuclear Research under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Li is also director of the Shanghai Joint Centre for Nanotechnology. "What the sector really needs now is a cool-headed attitude," noted Li.

from the priming-the-pump dept.
According to a report in the San Jose Mercury News ("Tech talent alarm sounded", by Tia OíBrien, 21 July 2001), foreign countries, not the United States, are increasingly producing the engineers and scientists driving high-tech innovations. The report says the shortage threatens to further slow the U.S. economy and high-tech innovation, as well as the U.S. position as a world technology leader. The article quotes Stanley Williams of Hewlett-Packard Labs and a leading molecular electronics researcher: "Everyone over the age of 45 in my lab was born in the United States. No one under the age of 45 in my lab is from the United States." Williams spoke at the New Democrat Network's fifth annual retreat, which brings Democratic members of Congress west to learn more about Silicon Valley's needs. Many of the legislators present back measures to provide additional funding to U.S. universities to encourage students in science and technology fields.

Similar concerns about a lack of native U.S. scientific talent were raised by the U.S. military in June 2001.

from the World-Watch dept.
The South Korean government has approved initial funding for the countryís ambitious new nanotechnology research program, according to the Korean Chosun newspaper ("W1.4 Trillion Earmarked for Nano-Technology", 18 July 2001). In a meeting of National Science and Technology Committee on 18 July 2001, presided over by President Kim Dae-jung, the government decided to inject a total of 1.485 trillion won (about US $1.148 billion), including W983 billion from the state sector and W501.5 billion from the private sector, into the nanotechnology sector over the next five years to bring the country's technical status in the sector to the level of advanced countries. The funding will go to the fostering the required manpower in the field for a total of 12,600 experts in the next ten years.

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Several articles from the special report on nanotechnology that appeared in Red Herring magazine in early July 2001 are now available online ("Nanotech grows up", 15 June/1 July 2001).

from the energetic-initiative dept.
An article from the Environmental News Network on nanoscale science and technology research at U.S. national laboratories under the Department of Energy ("U.S. national labs use nanoscience to study how to help environment", 19 July 2001) appears on the Small Times website. It provides a useful overview of work being done as part of the new U.S. Department of Energy's Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Initiative. Facilities covered include the new program at Brookhaven, Oak Ridge, and the new Joint Institute for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (JINN) established by the Pacific Northwest National Lab and the University of Washington.

The PNNL has established an extensive website that provides much useful information about JINN and other nanotech-related programs at the DoE national labs.