Nanowerk brings our attention to a new report by the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress titled Nanotechnology: The Future is Coming Sooner Than You Think (pdf), apparently authored by Senior Economist Joseph V. Kennedy and sponsored by Rep. Jim Saxton (R-NJ). On molecular nanosystems: At this stage a single product will integrate a ...

Small Times reports that nanotechnology medical applications are expected to climb immensely: U.S. demand for nanotechnology medical products will increase over 17 percent per year to $53 billion in 2011, says The Freedonia Group, Inc., a Cleveland-based industry research firm. Afterwards, the increasing flow of new nanomedicines, ...

Bernie Marcus, co-founder and one of Home Depot’s largest individual shareholders, has been named “Forbes/Wolfe 2006 Nanotech Person of the Year”. I was a little surprised until I read this interview; he’s quite a visionary and is putting his money where his mouth is. Here at Foresight, we like that a lot. [...]

The Institute for the Future, in a UK-funded study published on the Stanford website, presents eleven outlooks for nanotechnology over the next 50 years: • Better drug delivery through nanotechnology • Carbon nanotubes and lighter vehicles • The coming nanoshell revolution in oncology • The dream of biochemical nanocomputing • ...

Cognitive enhancement technologies already exist — if you drink coffee, you’re a user — so it seems likely that nanotechnology will eventually be used for this purpose. A new report (pdf) from the Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes at ASU summarizes the results of a workshop on this topic held with Sandia. [...]

A story by Jon Van describes the growing backlog of nanotechnology patent applications: As the time it takes to process patent applications now averages almost four years, double the time it took in 2004, nanotech entrepreneurs are beginning to worry that their ability to raise money to develop products may be stifled. It’s not just ...

Over at NewScientist.com, they’ve collected the 50-year forecasts of 70 “brilliant” scientists. Topics covered include nanotechnology and the control of physical matter, machine intelligence, and life extension. Here are a few excerpts: Peter Atkins, a Fellow and professor of chemistry at Oxford, on nanobio and synthetic ...

First, the good news. Here’s an update on the nanoactuator work reported previously. Not much new technical info, but new thoughts on cool applications: Researchers at the University of Portsmouth, UK, have developed an electronic switch based on DNA - a world-first bio-nanotechnology breakthrough that provides the foundation for the ...

The ETC Group has a new 63-page PDF report out titled “Nanotech Rx — Medical Applications of Nano-scale Technologies: What Impact on Marginalized Communities?” Although we at Foresight share ETC’s concern for these communities, we disagree with the report. A couple of excerpts: Can OECD donors who have failed to deliver ...

The Australian site InfoLink brings word of a new nanotech product from Australia-based company Nanovations: a silver nanoparticle-based paint which will kill antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The product is meant for hospitals and other facilities that have serious problems with infections caused by such bacteria. (Credit: Meridian) One problem ...