RTTA 1/1: Organization, Structure and Trajectories

RTTA 1/1 originally created a database of nanotechnology research articles containing 1.6 million citations covering over 20 years from 1990-2011. In addition to the publication database, RTTA 1/1 also developed a patent database that includes 116,000 nanotechnology patent applications and grants (from 71 patent offices worldwide including USPTO, EPO, WIPO, Chinese State Patent Office) and 91 countries covering the same time period.

The database was compiled using a search strategy published in Porter et al. (2008). The strategy is emerging as a public tool that other research groups are using or adapting. Researchers associated with the European ObservatoryNano compared six search approaches in preparation for its research monitoring activities and found that five of the six, including CNS-ASU's approach, converge on a similar definition (Huang et al. 2008). As a result, they are following our search approach as its benchmark for monitoring nanotechnology R&D.