Early this week I attended the Nano and emerging technologies forum in London, a networking conference where the UK’s nanotechnology community got together to discuss the state-of-the-art in this field.

Tony Ryan from the University of Sheffield opened the meeting with the statements: ‘the UK is the powerhouse of nanotechnology’ and ‘nanotechnology and the UK are in a good position to tackle the global grand challenges.’ And this was the message repeated by many others throughout the event.

And the cash is certainly there to support these scientists, with the UK’s research councils ploughing £50 million per year into the area and the Technology strategy board and various centres pledging to add a further £170 million to the pot over the next five years.

I thought the best way to give you a taste of the wide range of things being discussed was through sound bites from the best talks:

‘Nanobots would realistically need to look more like sperm, not submarines as they are often portrayed in the media’ according to Ryan. This is because they would need tails to allow them to ‘swim’ through our blood vessels. The UK community is currently trying to develop a viable medical robot funded by the EPSRC (Engineering and physical science research council) grand challenge in healthcare.

‘200 different chemicals are exhaled in our breath,’ Victor Higgs, director of Applied Nanodetectors. These can be used to monitor and diagnose diseases such as asthma and diabetes. His company is currently developing a mobile phone with a sensor that can detect nitric oxide levels in the breath of asthmatics. More on this device will be available on our homepage tomorrow.

‘We should develop nanotechnology that fulfils the needs of tomorrow, not the day after tomorrow,’ Christos Tokamanis from the European Commission. He says that thinking too far ahead will leave us with technology gaps that we can’t fill.

‘Biotech firms are hitting the buffers,’ Jonathan Heppe, a partner at venture capital firm Seroba-Kernel Life Sciences. He was talking about the current financial crisis meaning that venture capitalists are struggling to raise new funds, so most are focusing on their existing portfolios and not investing in new projects. He did however provide some data to suggest we might be turning a corner.

‘We can’t just shove nanoparticles into existing systems, we have to think very differently,’ Bruce Jefferson, Cranfield University. He was talking about the TiO₂ nanoparticle-based system he is developing for waste water treatment. Price is one of the major hurdles he is struggling to overcome: it needs to cost £0.10 per cubic metre of water treated and is currently at a whopping £100 per cubic metre!

‘Current systems are not competitive in mass markets due to high costs and unproven reliability,’ Robin Francis from the Carbon Trust on polymer fuel cells. The carbon trust is currently inviting grant applications for the £6 million the Carbon Trust will be investing in this area over the next five years.

‘Carbon dioxide could be turned back in to fuel,’ Peter Edwards, University of Oxford. His suggestion is that CO₂ could be used as a carbon source to create new hydrocarbon fuels, as an alternative to carbon capture and storage. This process is called tri-forming and will involve turning a mixture of CO₂, NO₂ and methane into petrochemicals. His team are currently investigating different catalysts to do this including nano-Co/Al₂O₃

Nina Notman