Whether it is actually used, the science is referenced in everything from state-of-the-art golf clubs to the iPod Nano. College kids and middle-aged corporate Americans alike are trying to tap into what the National Science Foundation predicts will be a one trillion dollar industry by 2015.
A new study by UW-Madison professor of life sciences communication Dietram Scheufele shows that although people are generally uninformed yet optimistic about developing nanotechnology, the ethical and environmental concerns continue to raise red flags for the public.
High-tech, science-gone-bad scenarios abound and may influence how the public forms its opinions about widely misunderstood topics like nanotechnology, according to Robert Hamers, chair of the chemistry department at UW-Madison and associate director of the campus Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center.
Depending on how you address [nanotechnology], you can always pander to people's hopes or you can pander to people's fears,"" Hamers said. ""You can sort of drive them one way or the other on the issue.""
Nanotechnology is a broad field that already has applications in hundreds of products currently on the market, according to Scheufele.
""The funding [for nanotechnology] has actually gone up since 2001
