0.3 Nanotechnology: it’s the little things that matter  (Page 5/8)

Multidisciplinary nanotechnology centre

In 2002 University of Wales, Swansea led a partnership involving UW Aberystwyth, UW College of Medicine and Cardiff University to create an infrastructure for development of cutting edge nanotechnology research. The Centre, which remains in operation, is multi-faceted, focusing on “boundary projects” operating in multidisciplinary fields. Core components of the initiative include:

• Specialist laboratories focused around a central hub at UW Swansea.
• State of the art research equipment with particular focus on imaging and fabrication.
• A team of over 50 researchers leading in their respective fields.
• A portfolio of “boundary projects” drawing in further support from Research Councils and industry.

The initiative has established itself as a leading research centre the success of which was recently reflected in the excellent outcome of the School of Engineering in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE).

Centre for nanohealth “son of mnc”

One of the prime foci of the Centre for NanoHealth (CNH) is the field of “Nanomedicine”. The reasons for specific interest in the field include the facts that:

• It is an extremely large field ranging from in vivo and in vitro diagnostics to therapy including targeted delivery and regenerative medicine.
• It has to interface nanomaterials (surfaces, particles, etc.) or analytical instruments with “living” human material (cells, tissue, body fluids).
• It creates new tools and methods that impact significantly existing conservative practices
• It builds upon established and emerging academic and commercial strengths within the cluster such as the MNC and Schools of Medicine and Engineering.

In the near future, the second and the third points represent the biggest challenge for developing nano-medical tools and devices, because due to the novelty of the field no infrastructures of European scale have evolved yet, which create the necessary close proximity between experts and facilities of different areas. This is essential for innovations in this field, and to create the condition of the fast translation of research results to the clinic for patients.

To overcome this problem a distributed infrastructure of specialised European poles of excellence of complementary expertise is a necessary first step. Each centre or node should already have: excellence in one area of nano-technology (surfaces, particles, analytics, integrated systems, etc.), a biological and/or medical research centre and hospital, and (most importantly) companies, which have access to and knowledge of the relevant markets. The missing expertise should be quickly and very easily accessible within this network of distributed infrastructures and expert pools:

• ‘Dedicated clinics or hospital units developing and testing nanotechnology based tools, devices and protocols should be supported in the key places across Europe.’
• ‘In fact, a few technological/ clinical centres will have to specialise on the transfer of nanomedical systems from the bench to the patient's bed – the “clinicalisation” of the nanomedical devices – to take into account its specificities.’
• ‘Testing patient's bio-samples on nanobio-analytical systems, implanting an in vivo nanobio device or injecting a nanotech based drug carrier require a specific environment in dedicated clinics as close as possible to nanotechnology centres, which is not currently found in the usual university hospitals.’
• ‘These places will also be key support facilities for joint training of medical doctors and technology developers.’
• ‘A European infrastructure based on such places with complementary nanotechnological and biomedical excellences will have the capacity to build up scientific and technical expertise at the interface between “nano” and “bio” to speed up the development of tools and devices for the market.’
• ‘Upgrading and combining these places therefore is crucial for effective market oriented developments in nanobiotechnology, because speed is the most critical key factor of success for bringing nanomedical devices or methods to the market in a competitive situation.’