Word: nanotech
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...White House has proposed that $710 million be spent on nanotech research next year--a 17% increase over the 2002 budget--on the development of everything from water-filtration equipment to military uniforms made from "smart" materials that can guard against germ warfare. Governments in Asia and Europe are investing $2 billion in similar R. and D., according to CMP-Cientifica, a research firm in Madrid. "Nanotech is a three-legged race right now," says Mark Modzelewski, executive director of the NanoBusiness Alliance, based in New York City...
Even enthusiasts like Modzelewski caution that no one should expect an overnight nanotech revolution. The technology will evolve--"radically," he says--as its benefits seep into virtually every crevice of human industry, from toys to tanks. And even professional investors are cautious. "True venture capitalists are not investing. They are watching," says Glenn Fishbine, author of The Investor's Guide to Nanotechnology and Micromachines. Only a handful of "pure play" nanotech stocks exist, including Nanophase Technologies, in Romeoville, Ill., which makes nanoscale powders, among them zinc oxide particles for sunscreen that won't turn lifeguards' noses white. Still, investors...
...shorten, allowing the linear motor to contract like a human muscle but at 1,000 times the strength. That's a simple task but an important one, and one MacGregor believes can reach markets worth $3.8 billion. The NanoMuscle, which costs less than $1 to make, qualifies as nanotech, the company says, because of the size of its nitinol crystals, not the wire or motion. MacGregor compares his product to $40-to-$100 small motors made by potential competitor RMB, of Biel-Bienne, Switzerland. Hasbro, a major investor in MacGregor's start-up, expects to deliver its first nano-powered...
Nanotubes could be the first commodity in the nanotech economy. Dozens of companies around the world already pump out mounds of the stuff--affectionately called soot--and sell it to some of the world's largest companies and labs for research: IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Samsung and NEC. Nano-Lab, in Brighton, Mass., is one of the few nanotech companies turning a profit. It sold $200,000 worth of made-to-order nanotubes in 2001 and is on track to more than double that amount this year. Last week HP researchers unveiled a way of manufacturing molecular-scale circuitry that will...
...nanotechnology produces more products and processes, will the technology ever catch up with Eric Drexler's theories? Says Steve Bent, a Washington patent lawyer for nanotech firms: "That will be the research agenda for the rest of the century." --With reporting by Jennifer L. Schenker/Paris