Overview

Eric Landree

Norio Taniguchi introduced the term "nanotechnology" in 1974, ^[363] and Eric Drexler popularized it in his much-debated book, Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology, ^[364] which charted a direction for the future of nanotechnology research and development. This publication focused largely on one aspect of nanotechnology, molecular assembly, which could in principle enable manufacturing and production through the bottom-up assembly of consumer goods and products, one atom at a time. This view expanded on the vision of Richard Feynman's famous 1959 lecture at California Institute of Technology, "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom." ^[365]

Currently, the U.S. government's National Nanotechnology Initiative uses the following criteria for defining nanotechnology:

1. Research and technology development at the atomic, molecular or macro-molecular levels, in the length scale of approximately 1 100 nanometer range.

2. Creating and using structures, devices and systems that have novel properties and functions because of their small and/or intermediate size.

3. Ability to control or manipulate on the atomic scale. ^[366]

Scientific advances in microscopy and related fields now allow us to routinely observe and manipulate materials on the atomic or molecular scale. Nanotechnology, broadly viewed, has had a profound impact in virtually every scientific discipline in the physical, chemical, and biological sciences. Given the rapid growth of the discipline and the impact nanotechnology has already had in both science and industry, it is difficult to chart exactly where advances in this technology may take us in the next 15 years. Nonetheless, it is...