Nanotechnology
This week, Earthbeat looks at the coming wave of nanotechnology. While activists have called our attention to corporations owning seeds, plants, even whole animals -- multi-national corporations have taken another tack -- patenting DNA itself.
Nanotechnology, the science of creating new life forms from scratch, isn't science fiction -- it's happening right now. On this edition of Earthbeat, we listen to two speakers from the recent What's Next symposium in Sweden.
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First Pat Mooney of the ETC group speaks about the past, present, and not-so distant future of nanotech.
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Following Mooney's presentation at the forum was the ETC Group's Jim Thomas, speaking about virtual biology.
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Host Daphne Wysham spoke to Pat Mooney of the ETC group from his office in Ottawa, Canada about possible ways that governments, organizations, and people can control nanotechnology.
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Comments
"Nanotechnology, the science of creating new life forms from scratch..."
That is the definition of synthetic biology, not nanotechnology. Defining nanotechnology as such is like defining environmentalism as "the act of saving owls".
Considering that synthetic biology makes many people uncomfortable, perhaps it's more like defining environmentalism as the act of destroying oil refineries.
Nanotechnology is simply the science of building things which are about 1-100 nanometers in size. It is a narrow branch of chemistry.
Anyone who listened to the broadcast may be interested in the new proposed guidelines for nanotech safety. The report includes a study on the titanium dioxide particles that Pat Mooney mentioned.
Posted by: Nick Ernst | June 21, 2007 09:54 PM