by Andrew Maynard | Aug 21, 2008 | Engagement, Nanotechnology, Public Perception
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 Emerging...
by Andrew Maynard | Jul 20, 2008 | Nanotechnology, Oversight, Policy
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 report on developing...
by Andrew Maynard | Jun 28, 2008 | Nanotechnology
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 coy about the use...
by Andrew Maynard | Jun 21, 2008 | Environment, Nanotechnology, Oversight
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 localized to small...
by Andrew Maynard | Jun 13, 2008 | Civic Science, Engagement, Synthetic Biology
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 emerging...
