2020 Science Archives
Here you’ll find all the currently existing posts on 2020 Science, in reverse date order. Feel free to browse through them, or if you’re looking for something specific, use the search box below.
Talking Nano
Whoever would have thought a science juggling act could be so much fun? Or so informative? Yet a couple of weeks back I found myself grinning like a ten year-old as I sat reviewing a new set of nanotech DVDs. The culprit: "The Amazing Nano...
Alphabet soup hides the secrets of safe nanotech!
After three years of hard work, International Standards Organization (ISO) Technical Committee TC229—set up in 2005 to develop nanotechnology-related standards—has finally begun delivering the goods. And the first documents off of the blocks...
Synthetic Biology 4.0—changing the way science is done
Sitting here absorbing the atmosphere at the Synthetic Biology 4.0 meeting in Hong Kong, I have the strangest feeling of being transported into a Kim Stanley Robinson novel. It’s not the cutting edge science being presented that is responsible,...
Carbon nanotube-rubber composite set to double operating lifetime of deep oil wells
Nanotechnology may be about engineering materials at a nanoscopic scale, but it is also about making a big impact through small changes. Both aspects of the emerging technology are exemplified in a new breakthrough from Shinshu University in Japan...
Is nanotechnology suffering from “silent rave” syndrome?
The silent rave might seem a rather bizarre social phenomenon; a group of strangers converging in a public place and dancing to their own individual iPod soundtracks. But I have a sneaking suspicion that the emerging technology community has been...
Small particles are sexy; Synthetic biologists are sexier!
The October issue of Esquire magazine is remarkable. Not for the world’s first e-ink cover (appearing on limited special editions of the magazine). But because three of the five scientists featured amongst the seventy-five most influential people...
Synthetic biology and the public: Time for a heart to heart?
So, you have a cool new science that could make a major impact on global challenges like energy, disease and pollution and you want to make sure it reaches its full potential. What do you do? At some point, having a heart to heart with “the...
Presidential Choice: It’s the science, stupid!
Forget the economy, healthcare, the war in Iraq. For some, the next President of the United States will need to rise to a far higher bar: Is he an e-mail junkie, or still stuck on snail mail? John McCain's lack of e-mail-savvy was the butt of...
2020 Science – looking forward with clarity
I’m sitting here putting the finishing touches to 2020science.org—a new science blog—and having the latest in a long stream of panic attacks: What on earth am I doing? Who wants to read yet another tedious list of personal musings, what makes me...
Nano-silver: Old problems or new challenges?
The blogging community is no stranger to the use (and possible abuse) of nanometre-scale silver—products ranging from silver-enhanced socks and toothpaste to plush toys and cure-alls have all appeared in the spotlight recently. With each passing month, the number of nano-silver gizmos on the market is growing.
Nanotoxicologists self-assemble
If you evaluate the toxicity of an engineered nanomaterial, how far can you trust your results? If someone else repeats your tests and gets a different answer, did they do it wrong? Did you? Or was the material used different in some subtle but...
Value-added nanotechnology
Amidst the cacophony of debate swirling around the true meaning of nanotechnology, I head a voice or reason last week. The voice was that of Dr. Bernd Sachweh of BASF, speaking at the European Aerosol Conference in Thessoloniki. I paraphrase, but...
A consumer’s guide to nanotechnology
How cool is this: A nanotech-enabled labcoat to protect the user against… well, nanomaterials presumably, amongst other things! The labcoat—which uses Nanotex technology to make it stain resistant—is part of a major update to the Project on...
Late lessons from early warnings
As the rate of technological progress advances, are we learning the lessons of past successes and failures? And are we applying these lessons successfully to nanotechnology? In 2001, the European Environment Agency (EEA) published a seminal...
Benny the Bear comes clean
Last December I highlighted the case of Benny the Bear—a soft toy using nano-silver to give it antimicrobial properties (Benny the Bear, and the case of the disappearing nanoparticles). It appeared at the time that the manufacturer was being rather...
Nano-sunscreens leave their mark
Painted metal roofs are cheap, convenient, and usually very durable. But over the past two years, a rash of accelerated ageing has blighted pre-painted steel roofing in Australia. And intriguingly the ageing—which affects the coating—seems to be...
Synthetic biology, ethics and the hacker culture
Read Thomas L. Friedman’s “The World is Flat” or Neal Stephenson’s “Cryptonomicon”, and you get a glimpse into how the hacker culture that emerged at the tail end of the twentieth century revolutionized the digital world. Will a confluence of...
Smart materials; smart choices?
Why nano? Why care? For non-nanotech initiates, an obsession with nanotechnology must sometimes seem a bizarre occupation of the sad and lonely. And even within the nanotechnology community, who hasn’t had occasional doubts over the legitimacy...
Carbon nanotubes: the new asbestos? Not if we act fast.
Mix carbon nanotubes and asbestos together (metaphorically) and you get an explosive mix—at least if news coverage of the latest publication coming out of Professor Ken Donaldson’s team is anything to go by. The research—published on-line today in...
Decoupling “nanotechnology”
"Nanotechnology" as an overarching concept is great for sweeping statements and sound bites, but falls short when it comes to real-world decision-making. As nanoscale technologies are increasingly used in everything from antimicrobial socks to...
Enough meetings already!
My worst nightmare—I’m sitting at the back of a small plane (by the bathroom), my knees up round my ears (because someone else with a bigger case got to the overhead storage before me), and a small child screaming its head off two rows down. But...
Nano-silver: Looking a little tarnished?
The author Neal Stephenson got it wrong—at least, if this week’s nano-news is anything to go by! In his landmark 1995 novel “The Diamond Age,” Stephenson described a future built on nano-innovation. But thirteen years later, nanotechnology seems...
Nanotechnology—in bed with Madonna?
If you want proof that nano is mainstream, just pick up the U.S. May edition of fashion magazine “Elle.” Sharing cover-space with Madonna is the latest article on nanotech and the beauty business. Elle might not be your first choice of reading...
U.S. nanotechnology risk research funding—separating fact from fiction
The most recent estimate from the U.S. National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) puts nanotechnology risk research investment at $68 million for 2006 (the only year complete figures are currently available for—apparently). Yet theProject on...
Of jellybeans and buckyballs…
Here’s a small diversion for a slow Sunday afternoon: Take sixty jellybeans and ninety cocktail sticks, and try to construct a model of a buckyball—a carbon-60 molecule. It’s tricky, but not impossible. Constructing a candy buckminster fullerene...
I’m breathing in nanoparticles, so why aren’t I dead already?
Read some accounts of nanotechnology risks, and you might be forgiven for concluding that a single engineered nanoparticle can kill you. Of course, a little critical thinking soon dispels this notion—we are constantly bombarded with incidental...
US town faces nanotechnology crisis
The small American town of Sunnyville is a town in crisis. Against a backdrop of job losses that have decimated the local community, citizens are struggling to decide whether to welcome two major nanotech-enabled industries into the town, or...
The passing of a science hero
On March 18th, the science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke died in his home in Sri Lanka at the age of 90. A master developer and assembler of ideas, Clarke will be remembered fondly by many for igniting their enthusiasm for science, and how it...
Smart science for the 21st century
Can current approaches to doing science sustain us over the next one hundred years? An increasing reliance on technological fixes to global challenges — including nanotechnology — demands a radical rethink of how we use science in the service of...
Communicating nanotechnology: Image counts!
What determines your view of nanotechnology—the message, or the messenger? Most of us would like to think it is the message that governs our internal risk-benefit analysis. But research published this week suggests other factors may be at work....