Designing Nanostructures at the Interface between Biomedical and Physical Systems

Last November, the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative held the Designing Nanostructures at the Interface Between Biomedical and Physical Systems conference at which researchers from science, engineering and medicine discussed recent developments in nanotechnology, directions for future research, and possible biomedical applications. The centerpiece of the conference was breakout sessions in which ten focus groups of researchers from different fields spent eight hours developing research plans to solve various problems in the field of nanotechnology. Among the challenges were:

• Building a nanosystem that can isolate, sequence and identify RNA or DNA
• Developing a system to detect disease in vivo
• Sequencing a single molecule of protein
• Creating a biological system that will create a local hydrogen fuel source, and
• Growing a biological in vivo power source.

Representatives from public and private funding organizations, government, industry, and the science media also participated in the focus groups. This book provides a summary of the conference focus groups. For more information about the conference, visit Keck Futures Initiative.

The National Academies Keck Futures Initiative was launched in 2003 to stimulate new modes of scientific inquiry and break down the conceptual and institutional barriers to interdisciplinary research. The National Academies and the W.M. Keck Foundation believe considerable scientific progress and social benefit will be achieved by providing a counterbalance to the tendency to isolate research within academic fields. The Futures Initiative is designed to enable researchers from different disciplines to focus on new questions upon which they can base entirely new research, and to encourage better communication between scientists as well as between the scientific community and the public.

Funded by a $40 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation, the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative is a 15-year effort to catalyze interdisciplinary inquiry and to enhance communication among researchers, funding agencies, universities, and the general public—with the object of stimulating interdisciplinary research at the most exciting frontiers. The Futures Initiative builds on three pillars of vital and sustained research: interdisciplinary encounters that counterbalance specialization and isolation; the identification and exploration of new research topics; and communication that bridges languages, cultures, habits of thought, and institutions. Toward these goals, the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative incorporates three core activities each year: Futures conferences, Futures grants, and National Academies Communication Awards.