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News
ASU’s Nanotech in Society Center Hosts Launch Event
January 23, 2005
Tempe, AZ –
Nanotechnology promises to have a profound impact on society. Defined as
science and engineering done at the scale of a billionth of a meter,
nanotechnology has been heralded by many scientists, futurists and
investors as the next industrial revolution.
But for every optimistic forecast of nanobots to perform microsurgery or
in-body sensors to monitor human health, there are doomsday scenarios of
nano-chips implanted in the brain that forever alter human identity or
nano-sensors publicly revealing all private places and information. How
can scientists, citizens, and policy makers be adequately engaged in a
dialogue about nanotechnology’s potential for good and ill? How can we
successfully govern nanotechnology?
On Monday, January 30, nanotechnology leaders from across the nation
will gather in Tempe as ASU launches its Center for Nanotechnology in
Society. The culmination of the launch event will be a Public Forum on
Nanotechnology in Society from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. in the Great Hall
(Armstrong Hall) of the College of Law.
A distinguished panel of scientists, policy experts and ethicists will
convene for this important discussion. The panel includes remarks from
ASU President Michael Crow, David Guston, director of the Center for
Nanotechnology in Society; George Poste, director of the Biodesign
Institute; and Jonathan Moreno, University of Virginia Professor of
Biomedical Ethics and co-chair of the National Academies’ committee on
human embryonic stem cell research.
Guston called the event “the beginning of an unprecedented effort to
expand our knowledge of how emerging technologies like nanotechnology
interact with society, to train students to understand those
interactions, and to involve the general public in helping to make
decisions, along with scientists and engineers and policy makers, about
what nanotechnology’s future will be like.”
Last fall, the National Science Foundation awarded ASU $6.2 million to
establish the Center for Nanotechnology in Society (CNS-ASU). The Center
is a collaboration of the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes (CSPO)
and the Biodesign Institute at ASU.
CNS-ASU is the largest in a network of $14.3 million in newly funded NSF
activities on nanotechnology and society, which includes a second $5
million center at the University of California-Santa Barbara and
additional projects at Harvard University and the University of South
Carolina.
The ASU Center will be a “center of excellence” for the National
Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI), a federal research and development
(R&D) program established to coordinate the multi-agency efforts in
nanoscale science, engineering, and technology.
According to the NNI, federally supported nanotechnology R&D in 2005 was
$1 billion, and the future global marketplace for goods and services
using nanotechnologies will grow to $1 trillion by 2015.
However, nano- scientists and engineers are still working out the rules
and techniques for imaging, manipulating and manufacturing matter at
this minute atomic scale, 10,000 times smaller than the width of a human
hair. And social scientists and humanists are just starting to
understand how such inquiries and technologies interact with the broader
society.
The launch event will gather a broad network of CNS-ASU researchers and
collaborators, including researchers from the University of Wisconsin,
Madison; Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta; North Carolina State
University, Raleigh; University of Colorado, Boulder; Rutgers
University, New Brunswick, N.J.; and other universities and private and
public sector groups.
CNS-ASU focuses on two broad research themes: freedom, privacy, and
security; and human identity, enhancement, and biology.
CNS-ASU will also experiment with a novel approach of teaming social
scientists and nano-scientists to consider the ethical and social
dimensions of nanotechnology as the new technologies are developed in
real-time. The Center also incorporates regular meetings with and
feedback from citizens, policy makers, and business leaders on their
perspectives on nanotechnology.
“The Center will help both researchers and citizens develop a better
understanding of where scientific and social values come from, what they
mean, and how they shape the direction that nanotechnology takes,” said
Guston.
By understanding the interactions between nanotechnology and society,
the Center hopes to encourage informed discussions and improve policy
choices and technological outcomes for the benefit of society.
The forum is free and open to the public. A public reception with light
fare will be held following the forum. For more information, visit
http://cns.asu.edu or call
480-727-8787.
The event is co-sponsored by the Center for
Nanotechnology in Society,
The Biodesign
Institute, the
Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes, and the
Center for Biology and Society.
The vision of CNS-ASU is that research into the societal aspects of
nanoscale science and engineering (NSE), carried out in close
collaboration with NSE scientists and combined with public engagement,
will improve deliberation and decision making about NSE. Its goal is
nothing less than charting a path toward new ways of organizing the
production of knowledge and developing and testing new processes of
anticipatory governance to meet the emerging promises and challenges of
NSE. For more information on the CNS-ASU, visit
http://cns.asu.edu.
Contacts:
Dave Guston, Director
Center for Nanotechnology in Society
PO Box 874401
Tempe, AZ 85287-4401
480-727-8829
480-727-8791 (FAX)
david.guston@asu.edu
http://cns.asu.edu
Media Contact
Joe Caspermeyer
480-727-0369
Joseph.caspermeyer@asu.edu
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