Christine Peterson Talks Nanotech

Thesis: Christine Peterson, founder of the Foresight Institute, spoke to the Stanford Business School futurist club, delivering an optimistic vision of what might be possible with nanotech as we move into the next half-century.

Christine Peterson, founder of the Foresight Institute, is well known in the nanotechnology community and an authoritative voice on the future and responsible use of nanotechnology. Peterson's talk this Monday was mostly introductory for the purpose of educating students who wanted to understand nanotechnology and its implications for the economy. She began by providing some statistics related to the rapid increase in nanotech funding in the public and private domains and a comparison of the relative commitment to nanotech in different countries. Interestingly, she noted that China can conduct nanotech research at 1/6 the cost of the United States because of cheaper labor, and that complicated export controls have caused some entrepreneurs and academics to move their projects to China.

Peterson's discussion of nanotechnology was presented in a time-horizon framework. In the near-term (3 to 5 years) Peterson asserted that materials science will be the most affected by nanotechnology, with applications in medicine, sensors, solar power, batteries, coatings, insulation, filters, lubricants, fuels, and other areas. She remarked that one of the most important issues to be resolved in the near-term is nano toxicity. Some consumer advocacy groups have become nervous or anti-nano based on a mixed bag of studies that indicate that some basic nanomaterials could be toxic to humans.

In the mid-term, Peterson stated that we will begin to see more advanced applications of nanotech in sensors, actuators, active materials, electronics, and targeted drug delivery. She did not provide exact timing for this "mid-term timeframe" and said that it is difficult to predict. She cited the Institute of Soldier Nanotechnologies at MIT as a research group investing in these type of technologies. I was somewhat surprised to see "targeted drug delivery" on this list as opposed to the short-term time frame and would be curious to know when she thinks we will begin to see these applications.

In the long-term, Peterson was somewhat coy in her assessment. She hinted at a "next industrial revolution" and deep structural changes to civilization without providing specific examples. I think she avoided getting into the specifics because a) they're very difficult to predict and b) a crowd of nanotech neophytes would probably react skeptically to radical futurist visions involving nanobots, gray-goo, the singularity, spiritual machines, etc... She did, however, describe molecular manufacturing and show some schematics, suggesting that molecular medical repairs, environmental clean up, and more effective space travel will made possible by this manufacturing technology.

Finally, during the question and answer session I asked Mrs. Peterson about the status of the ongoing debate related to the molecular manufacturing vision of nanotech. Experts have debated the physical feasibility of molecular manufacturing for years. In the past, the debate has symbolically been between Eric Drexler (author of "Engines of Creation," the seminal book on nanotechnology) and the recently deceased Dr. Richard Smalley (Nobel Prize winner for the discovery of buckey balls, a C60 carbon structure integral to nanotechnology). She responded by saying that the debate is indeed divisive, that surveys indicate about 50% of experts agree that molecular manufacturing is possible and 50% believe it is impossible. She argued that once additional developments occur more people will come to the side of possibility. She also noted that the Foresight Institute presaged the use of HTML and the internet when nobody believed it would become ubiquitous; within a few years of their prediction, the world wide web had become a reality.

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