From the conference report Setting an Agenda for the Social Studies of Nanotechnology (PDF):
For example, researchers at Rice University have been working on the use of nanoparticles to absorb arsenic from drinking water supplies.
Nanoscale iron oxide absorbs arsenic effi ciently, but in many countries implementing the process is either too expensive or technically impossible. The Rice researchers realized they could use magnetic filtration for nanosorbents, which, at the small-size range, could pull out unsafe particles with a handheld magnet…
The “recipe” to make nanoscale magnetite can be posted on the Web, allowing the technique to be distributed to many villages and used by any individual with modest means in a regular kitchen setting.
This solution might be called “open-source nanotechnology”…
So, the recipe “can” be posted on the web, but has this happened? Unclear. —Christine
