The FIRST organization — inspired by inventor Dean Kamen — and the Lego Group are sponsoring the 2006 Nano Quest Challenge, and sadly for the rest of us, it seems to be limited to kids 9-14 years old, plus 6 to 9-year-olds in the junior league in US and Canada. But wait — all the… Continue reading Nanotechnology: Check out the 2006 Nano Quest Challenge
Roger Brent, director of the Molecular Sciences Institute in Berkeley, is a leader in open source biotech: Putting his patents where his principles are, Dr. Brent’s institute has drafted an “Open Source Policy” which commits to “[making] reagents and methods freely available to the research community.” You can see MSI’s open source policy and a… Continue reading Nanotechnology: Lessons from open source biotech
In the U.S., psychoanalysis has fallen a bit out of fashion. But in Italy, a psychonanalyst heads up their bioethics organization, Centre for Science, Society and Citizenship. A year ago, Professor Emilio Mordini presented on “Dreams, Hopes and Uncertainties in the Nano Revolution” at EuroNanoForum 2005: Nanotechnology and the Health of the EU Citizen in… Continue reading Psychoanalyst takes on nanotechnology
Atomistix has just expanded to the U.S. at the Innovation Center Denmark in Palo Alto, not far from Foresight. I missed their open house on September 28, but I see that their CEO Thomas Magnussen explained the value of computational modeling in nanotechnology: Over time, the price of nanotechnology experimentation has gone up while the… Continue reading How to save $149,850 per nanotechnology experiment
[UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers. If you like to get nano news, free subscription to our e-newsletter is at the right, part way down, on this blog’s home page.] From scientific animation company XVIVO in collaboration with Harvard comes an 8-minute video showing nature’s nanotechnology: molecular machinery of the cell, in action: Nuclei, proteins and lipids… Continue reading Must-see video on nature's nanotechnology
[UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers. For free e-newsletter, subscribe at right, part way down, on this blog’s home page.] The ETC Group, recently mentioned here for its PR skills, has announced a contest to design a Nano-Hazard symbol for nanotechnology: Standard setting bodies around the world are now scrambling to agree on nomenclature that can describe… Continue reading Think twice before labeling nanotechnology products
From the Popular Mechanics Breakthrough Awards for 2006, MIT’s Angela Belcher and colleagues are using viruses to build at the molecular level: VIRAL MANUFACTURING Innovators: Angela Belcher, Yet-Ming Chiang, Paula Hammond MIT scientists reached a major nanotech milestone: re-engineering a virus to create a self-assembling product. THE GOAL OF nanofabrication is to make tiny machines… Continue reading Viruses begin to do nanotechnology construction at MIT
Lots of people say that nanotech R&D should include international collaborations, but these are not always easy to set up, especially the money part. To the rescue is Nanoforum, a “European Nanotechnology Gateway” funded by the EU, which has published a report (free reg. req’d) listing such opportunities: Countries for which funding opportunities have been… Continue reading Finding funds for int'l nanotechnology collaborations
One of the top four nanotech articles highlighted in the first issue of Nature Nanotechnology is “Making Molecular Machines Work” by Wesley Browne and Ben Feringa. Full text of the article is free, at least for now. From the conclusions: The exquisite solutions nature has found to control molecular motion, evident in the fascinating biological… Continue reading Molecular machines highlighted in 1st issue of Nature Nanotechnology
The ETC Group has a new 63-page PDF report out titled “Nanotech Rx — Medical Applications of Nano-scale Technologies: What Impact on Marginalized Communities?” Although we at Foresight share ETC’s concern for these communities, we disagree with the report. A couple of excerpts: Can OECD donors who have failed to deliver promised mosquito netting to… Continue reading Nanotechnology medicine policy report disputed
