Nanotech: science of small needs big attention
Seema Singh -
Wednesday, July 16, 2008 10:56 PM
There was some nanotechnology buzz today. Sabeer Bhatia's famous Nano City project had an equity investor; Parsvnath Developers Limited picked up 38% stake in this Haryana-based highly ambitious project. When I had spoken to Bhatia in April 2006, soon after he annouced his project, he had said, "Just development of real-estate in this venture will require an investment of $2.5B... This is not a 2-3 year project. It will take 10-15 years before we start seeing quality research and products come out of Nano City. But we have to start now."
Indeed the Rs 50,000-crore valued project has a good start. (By the way, this nano city is not just about nanotech.)
In another development of the day, Karnataka government today announced its 2nd annual nanotech event to be held on Dec 12-14, which the organizers, being mentored by none other than the noted materials scientist CNR Rao, aim to eventually shape on the lines of the famous NSTI (http://www.nsti.org/Nanotech2008/) annual event in the US. Bangalore is one of the three places (along with Mohali and Kolkata) to have a nano science and technology centre, under the central government's Rs 1000-crore five-year national nanotech mission.
The science of small holds big promises. The US National Science Foundation estimates that by 2015, nanotech-led/based goods and services could contribute over $1 trillion to the global economy.
But signs of warning are creeping in: studies are indicating harmful health effects of nanoparticles (http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/print/5487). But in India we do not have any regulation for the safe use of nanotechnology in healthcare and environment. Whenever I've asked scientists, they've said "we will work on it", "it's definitely on our agenda" and so on. I admit I haven't done rigorous reporting on this but it seems safety/regulation/monitoring are still on the backburner. (India has almost screwed up its agri-biotech sector due to similar issues.)
My worry is that in not keeping these safety measures mainstream, we might once again delay benefits of a promising technology, a la GM food!