"Nanotechnology Now"
magazine recently interviewed twelve
people (including myself) who are involved with the emerging world of
nanotechnology. They've now published the results of
the interviews in Issue 2 of their "NanoNews"
newsletter. All twelve of the participants'
responses are available in that publication, which
you can find through
http://www.nanotech-now.com/newsletter/
. Issue 2
specifically is available at no cost as part of
their free trial subscription.
The participants include (with partial
affiliations shown here):
Sen. George Allen,
U.S. Senator (R.-Va.)
Morten Bogedal,
CEO, Nordic Nanotech
A.S. Daar,
Professor of Public Health Sciences and of
Surgery, University of Toronto
Neil Gordon,
Partner, Nanotechnology, with Sygertech
Tim Harper,
Founder & President, CMP Cientifica
Jeffrey Harrow,
Principal and Technologist, The Harrow Group
Lerwen Liu,
President, ABACUS Partners
Cathy Murphy,
Guy F. Lipscomb Professor of Chemistry, Univ. of
S. Carolina
Vic Pena,
Co-founder & CEO, nanoTitan Inc.
Ottilia Saxl,
Ion European Board & Founding Director, The
Institute of Nanotechnology
Bo Varga,
Principal and Strategic Consultant, The
Strategic Synergy Group
Dennis Wilson,
Chief Technology Officer, Chairman of the Board,
and Founder, Nanotechnologies, Inc.
However, if you
don't wish to register on their site, you'll find
the questions plus my answers
(one-twelfth of the content) below, in this "Harrow
Technology Report"
Special Report.
The following
twelve interview questions were developed by
"Nanotechnology Now" Editor Rocky Rawstern,
Chris Phoenix of the Center for Responsible
Nanotechnology (CRN), and Tim Harper of Científica.
Where
Do We Stand
With Nanoscale Technologies?
'Nanotech Now': From your point of
view, what is nanotechnology?
Jeff Harrow: Nanotechnology is, as
strictly defined by many, dealing with, studying,
manipulating or otherwise interacting with matter
below the size of 100 nanometers (billionths of a
meter.) Less strictly, it's all about our learning
from, and learning to deal with, the world of very
tiny things which might be more broadly interpreted
as things smaller than a micron (1,000 nanometers).
But definitions aside, nanotechnology is about
drastically shrinking the "tinker toys" we play
with. Imagine building the 47 million transistors in
a typical CPU chip, with your original Lego set --
even if the blocks were appropriately
semi-conductive, it wouldn't work because the
resulting size would be too big, introducing
unacceptable speed-of-light delays to the signals.
Yet today, working with far smaller "Legos," 47
million transistors in a thumbnail-sized patch of
silicon that works quite well is routine.
As we shrink the "Legos"
much further though, we find that the way that each
Lego works, and how it interacts with other
similarly-nano-sized Legos, changes dramatically
(quantum physics). Also, as we learn to better
understand and work with these ever-tinier building
blocks, we're going to be blurring many of the
"lines" we've historically drawn between individual
"sciences," and even the lines between things living
and dead. To me, it's this vast landscape of the
unknown, and of the possible, that defines the
promise of nanotechnology.
Why are you
involved with nanotechnology? What are your
long-term goals for your area or field?
Jeff Harrow: I'm involved with
nanotechnology because I see it as one of the basic
"change the rules" inflection points in our
evolution, on a par with the harnessing of
electricity, oil, and semiconductors. The bottom
line is that as we learn more about, and get better
working with nanotechnology, we'll begin building
things from the "ground-up" as Nature does, rather
than from the "top-down" as our past and present
manufacturing methods do (grinding, polishing, etc.)
And at the level of building things atom by atom, or
molecule by molecule, there may eventually be NO
difference between how Nature builds things, and how
we do. Which is both scary and tremendously
powerful, at the same time. One of my goals is to
help people (not just the "techies") understand the
elements of nanotechnology at the "ground floor"
level, so that we can all be prepared to engage in
the many important nanotechnology dialogs
surrounding safety, opportunities, and more. Also,
with this knowledge, people will be better-poised to
make intelligent and forward-looking decisions about
how they, and their businesses, can prosper in this
"changing of the rules."
What is your
vision regarding the changes that nanotechnology
will bring to society?
Jeff Harrow: Taken to its extreme,
the entire value chain of our society, built around
the relative scarcity of, and difficulty of
producing "manufactured goods," could change.
Imagine if we end up with "desktop manufactures" --
devices conceptually like an inkjet printer that,
instead of building up layers of ink, build layers
of atoms or molecules in exactly the correct 3D
structures to produce a piece of silverware, or a
working cell phone (of the latest design, of course,
through licensing the "schematic" from the developer
and downloading it over the Internet), or -- and
here's where it gets really scary -- a living thing.
"Intellectual property," rather than manufactured
goods, might prevail, which would dramatically
change our societies. (And, we'd better learn the
"Napster" lesson, or there will be little long-term
"product innovation").
This is an extreme
vision, of course, and less dramatic advances may
simply yield vastly more efficient machines
(building at this atomic/molecular level is FAR more
precise, and probably energy-efficient, than
manufacturing the old way), vastly improved building
materials, and improbable inventions based on our
growing understanding of just how differently things
work at the nanoscale. And, it seems increasingly
likely that we'll be able to (eventually)
manufacture tiny machines that could course through
our bodies to target infections, root-out plaque
from arteries, or even perform inside-out surgery.
The bottom line is we
can only barely imagine the changes to come --
imagine if you were around at the introduction of
electricity, the telephone, or gasoline -- could you
have predicted what each (and in combination) have
wrought? Flying machines; humans on the Moon; pocket
cell phones; even air conditioning for the masses...
In fact, you WERE
around only about ten years ago as the World Wide
Web gained popularity and dramatically changed how
many businesses operate. Few saw the potential. Yet
the potential from nanotechnology could make those
historical watersheds seem as a drop in the lake...
How can
government and educational institutions address the
need for significantly larger numbers of
nano-educated college grads?
Jeff Harrow: Until nanotechnology
assumes the popular mantles once held by the
computer and software industries, it may take
incentives to get schools to teach the technologies
widely, and to convince students that this could be
a key to a golden future. On the other hand, once
nanotechnology DOES become well known, the
educational institutions had best get ready for the
rush! (Indeed, the tools of this realm-of-the-tiny
are already becoming affordable by secondary schools
(or their districts), such as an Atomic Force
Microscope being sold by NanoSurf for about $8,000!
(http://www.nanosurf.ch/).
Given that most
people do not have advanced science training, how
can they participate in the debate over advanced
technologies? What, if anything, are you planning to
do to educate or enable public debate in these
areas?
Jeff Harrow: The only way to
effectively participate in the important debates
revolving around nanotechnology is to become
educated about the field. This does NOT require a
technical degree or any math or science skills, or
the interest and ability to understand exactly "how
it works" (although clearly some people will have
those skills and knowledge.) But because
nanotechnology does seem poised to "change
everything," an open mind -- MANY open minds from
domains technical and not -- are needed to assure
that the hard questions are looked into, and that
the public debate encompasses not only scientific
issues, but also the very real and significant
public policy issues that our learning to work like
"Nature," demands.
Like many fields of
study before it, but perhaps even more so,
nanotechnology holds the potential for great good,
and for great harm. Only by EACH of us becoming
knowledgeable, in the areas and to the extent we're
individually interested and able, can we assure that
we'll end up in a society that we can, quite
literally, live with.
In my particular case,
that's exactly why I've been educating a broad
spectrum of people about the coming nanotechnology
revolution through my online technology journal,
"The Harrow Technology Report" at
www.TheHarrowGroup.com
, and through a series of interactive multimedia
consulting presentations that I bring to businesses
and organizations, large and small, around the globe
(see
http://www.theharrowgroup.com/consulting.htm).
Given that any
technology poses some degree of risk to people and
the environment, what do we need to do in order to
avoid serious and unexpected harm arising from
nanotechnology?
Jeff Harrow: Broad public
understanding and knowledge, as we explored in the
previous question, is paramount. It is this 'public
openness' that will enable people to "hold the
scientists' feet to the fire," so that they are
accountable for not inappropriately letting this
nanotech cat out of the bag. Several authors, such
as Michael Creighton through "Prey," are providing
some needed "scare tactics" to help average people
understand the possible threats from this new
world-of-the-tiny (although remember, such fiction
novels are not necessarily factual as they strive to
make an important point.) But threats are a real
potential (although they won't have to follow those
threats dealt with in fiction), and such threats
must be dealt with in-advance!
On the other hand,
these threats are NOT a reason to try to halt the
scientific process (such censorship simply does not
work in a global society, anyway.) Indeed, there are
many sciences and their resulting
technologies that "pose some degree of risk to
people and the environment." The trick for
nanotechnology, as with all fields, is to pursue the
research with appropriate technological and societal
cautions and safeguards.
Several leading
researchers have predicted an unprecedented rapid
development of extremely powerful technologies, and
been proven correct. And the trend continues,
upward. In your opinion, does this require the
development of new ethics and/or regulations?
Jeff Harrow: That's an interesting
question, because it seems that societal ethics and
regulation always lag, sometimes dramatically, the
technologies that seem to follow a
double-accelerating curve of advancement (not only
do some technologies' capabilities double
continuously, but the RATE at which they double is
itself doubling.) Yet humans, and by extension their
societies and laws, tend to grow at a more linear,
"plodding" rate. Nevertheless, societies' ethics and
regulations DO respond to new developments. Not
perfectly; not always "in time," but we (so far)
have been pretty good about self-preservation.
The same, I believe,
will occur with those changes needed to embrace
nanotechnology. The more people know about this
field, the more they will develop an ethic that
encompasses the changes that nanotechnology will
bring, and the better our legislators will be
prepared to enact those regulations necessary to
instantiate the new ethic. Think of the evolution of
traffic laws and the resulting cultural changes.
(For example, drunk driving, once seen by many in
society as a "norm," has recently been accepted as
the killer that it is. This changed society's
once-light ethic towards such activities, led in
part through public awareness brought about by
organizations such as Mothers Against Drunk
Driving.)
Similarly, our ethics
and regulations will (have to) change to incorporate
nanotechnology's new realities.
What risks do you
expect from future nanotechnologies, including
molecular manufacturing? What, if anything, are you
planning to do to address public concerns about
issues such as gray goo?
Jeff Harrow: Since nanotechnology
is in its infancy, it's difficult-to-impossible to
realistically define the threats that might develop.
On the one hand, it's easy to conceive of the "gray
goo" scenario, where nano-assemblers, devices that
grab raw atoms or molecules and manufacture them
into more nano-assemblers who then go off and do the
same, might get out of hand and rape the environment
to create a geometrically expanding "gray goo" of
run-amok nano-assemblers. In part, it's the public
debate that we explored above that will help
scientists to consider ways to guard against such
threats.
On the other hand, for a science so new and with
such potential to affect things at their most basic
level, I can conceive that new, previously
unanticipated threats at all levels will become
possible as we turn over each new nano-leaf. We'll
never foresee them all, just as Madam Curie never
imagined the harm that radium could cause (including
her death), or as in the 1950s, shoe stores proudly
announced how they used fluoroscopes to XRAY
childrens' feet to assure a good shoe fit.
Damage was caused, but
we learned. Society mourned the damages, but we
moved forward. With nanotechnology, as with most
every other field, damage will also be done (but
hopefully in very limited areas due to the
knowledge, oversight, and ethics we've been
discussing), and we will learn. Thus has it always
been so. Pragmatically, risk is part of the game,
although we should (must) do everything practically
possible to minimize the risks without killing the
nanotech Golden Goose.
How can the
benefits of new technology, including
nanotechnology, be made available to all people, not
just an elite?
Jeff Harrow: Pragmatically, it
seems to me that most new technologies have
traditionally first been available to "the rich" or
"elite" of a society. The products of new
technologies, be they metal tools, the finest of
swords, the first cars, and leading-edge
experimental drugs, are often initially so expensive
that those folks are the only ones able to afford
them.
But one of the
advantages of many of the technologies that we deal
with today is how quickly they become inexpensive
and so affordable by the many. Take computers, for
an example -- today, they're affordable by most
families in developed countries, while they were a
very expensive luxury only a decade ago. I
anticipate a similar trend in products derived from
nanotechnology, especially since it's already begun!
(Consider one of the first common nanotechnology
products, the accelerometers in cars that help
determine when the airbag deploys; they and their
related systems were initially very expensive, but
are now commonplace in even inexpensive cars.) I
suspect that the fruits of nanotechnology will
follow a similar curve.
By necessity,
government plays a role in many aspects of our
lives. What role do you see government playing in
the development of nanoscale technologies?
Jeff Harrow: Government often holds
the purse strings to encourage expensive research.
As such, (and it is already beginning), government
holds the power to get nanotechnology research off
the ground and out into the marketplace. Admittedly,
this is often a result of the government's desire to
have the fruits of the research available for the
military or other government programs, but many past
government-fostered research programs have also
yielded very direct benefit to the populous as well.
Consider the old standby Teflon, or the GPS network,
or in fact the Internet...
The trick, of course,
is for the government to be able to encourage and
fund such research, and standardize on effective
safety protocols, without bureaucratically killing
the necessary innovation. That's a hard and often
very frustrating process, but it has yielded some
fascinating results to date...
What role can
nanoscale technologies play in any given country’s
growth within the global economy?
Jeff Harrow: I suspect that
nanotechnology, over the long term, will confer an
unprecedented "competitive advantage" to those
countries who first master the related technologies.
So much so that being the first country to
successfully develop the fruits of nanotechnology
could tip the traditional international trade
balance. It's that fundamental, and that
significant. To take just one example, consider the
economic position of a country that had developed
safe and effective nanomachines that could be
injected into the body and target and destroy only
cancer cells. Or the ability to create perfect
gem-quality diamonds 'from the bottom-up'. Or the
ability to perfectly copy and reproduce raw
materials or manufactured goods that "used" to be
the major export of a country... The list could be
endless, when considering the potential to do things
Nature's way, and it behooves every country to pay
attention.
If you could sit
down with the leaders of every country and talk to
them about the development of nanotechnology, what
issues would you focus on?
Jeff Harrow: Safety, safety, and
safety. And within those boundaries, moving
nanotechnology forward as quickly as feasible. And
of trying to prepare for sane ways of introducing
the resultant technologies and products in ways that
don't destructively destabilize the world scene.
Nanotechnology holds
the power for incredible good, and for incredible
harm. Even more so than the atomic bomb. Let's be
sure that we all -- ALL of us -- do it "right!"
Jeffrey R. Harrow
About
"The Harrow Technology Report
"The Harrow Technology Report" explores the innovations and
trends of many contemporary and emerging technologies, and then draws some less
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the Knowledge Age.
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