Editor’s note: This article was first published in February 2011. Its figures and forecasts are from 2011, including a market of over €500 billion expected to double before 2015, the NSF forecast for “this year” and the prediction of multi-terabyte USB drives “very soon”.
When we talk about nanotechnology, we’re talking about a business that covers lighter yet stronger materials for cars, medicine, smart food packaging, scratch-proof glass and cement made by burning rice.
With the latest advances, this is already possible, and in the very near future this science will gain ground in computing, where we’ll be able to work with high-speed computer components and high-capacity magnetic storage. In fact, very soon we’ll be able to buy a USB flash drive with a capacity of several terabytes.
Nanotechnology is the control and handling of matter at the nanometre scale, that is, a billionth of a metre. At that scale it is possible to manipulate behaviour at the atomic and molecular level.
Nanotechnology will be the greatest medical advance in history, because among many other things it will improve the diagnosis of diseases, allow the insertion of medical micro-implants and make it possible to replace an organ (a lung, a kidney…) with an artificial, non-organic one.
According to experts, the nanotechnology business is worth more than €500 billion worldwide, and that figure is expected to double before 2015.
The National Science Foundation forecasts that this very year the nanotechnology-related market will reach exactly €1.1 trillion.
In Spain, as in most countries, large companies and corporations are already applying nanotechnology in their manufacturing processes.
Acciona Infraestructuras is already testing the reinforcement of beams with carbon nanotubes on some roads.
Farmamar has registered nearly 50 nanopharma patents, so right now the future is well worth watching. The future of business comes in “nano” form, which means any investment in nanotechnology companies could bring us high returns in the long term.
The future is full of changes that until now seemed like science fiction, as we saw in the article the 10 jobs of the future, where we explained which professions will be the most futuristic and in demand. More than futuristic, though, they are already part of our present, since employers are already looking for these kinds of professionals.
Further reading
Featured image: Geoff Hutchison, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr.
