Iran Indian Joint Conference on Nanotech: Prof Ali Beitollahi’s Invitation

Close to the heels of Indo-Japanese Nanotech initiative and Nano Technology Conclave 2008, the Iran India Joint Conference on Nanotechnology(IIJCN) is all set for Apr 27 – 29 2008. The conference is to be held in Tehran, Iran and is organized by Tehran University of Medical Science, and is co-sponsored by Iran Nano-Technology Initiative.
I came to know about the conference during the Nanotech Conclave 2008 presentation by Prof Ali Beitollahi heading the Iran Nano Technology Infrastructure Development Committee. Prof Beitollahi says there are more than 57 companies in Iran involved in nano tech activities of which 20 have successful
products till date. Iran Nano tech business network is a good place to start exploring about their offerings. They have a nano tube production unit with – 20kg/day output.
They make their own Scanning Tunneling microscope and export them too. A Nano additive for petrol makes it greener. They do Stem cell research and have made advances in cellular nano scaffolding.

Responding to the question of how resources gets shared, Prof Beitollahi recounted how every research group wants their own machinery and control them with lock and key. To encourage sharing, the Iran Nano Initiative has devised a incentive program that makes more funding available based on sharing score. Even service offered by technicians are included in the scoring and surprisingly and very interestingly, the incentive program works. Yet another reason to go to the conference at Tehran and see for yourself how it works!

Here is a segment from the conference website that caught my eyes:

So strong is the Persian aptitude for versifying everyday expressions that one can encounter poetry in almost every classical work, whether from Persian literature, science, or metaphysics. For example, almost half of Avicenna’s medical writings are known to be versified. Works of the early era of Persian poetry are characterized by strong court patronage, an extravagance of panegyrics, and what is known as سبک فاخر (“exalted in style”).

“Love’s nationality is separate from all other religions,
The lover’s religion and nationality is the Beloved (God).
The lover’s cause is separate from all other causes.
Love is the astrolabe of God’s mysteries”.—Rumi.

Nanotech is verse of different kind and Iran India Joint Conference on Nanotech will showcase some of the gems of that kind for sure.

Further, Mr Ali Morteza Birang, Attache, Head of Technology Cooperation Section, Embassy of Iran at New Delhi will be happy to provide additional information and coordination for the event. He can be reached by email birang at gmail dot com.

Nano Tech Conclave: Nomura Research Institute, Indo-Japanese partnership

The Nano Technology Conclave 2008 was jointly organized by Nomura Research Institute Here I’d like to highlight some of the key aspects of Nomura that I learned and their motivations to be part of Nano Tech Conclave. Frankly, I heard the name Nomura for the first time only in the context of the Conclave, prior to that I just thought Nomura is a just a Japanese last name. From the internet lookup and from the NRI web site, it is clear that they are part of large and reputed financial services business(ESTD ~ 1925) with the associated research and consulting practices.
I was throughly impressed by Dr Naoki Ikezawa, Chief Industry Specialist, NRI, for the thoughtful assembly of experts for the conference and enthusiastic participation in the conclave from start to end.[Unlike the Indian counterparts who disappeared from the scene mid-course of the conclave. I'm sure they must be having very good reasons for the same yet I'm not impressed!]

The content presented by the Japanese team was relevant and of excellent quality. For instance, at the forenoon session, just after Dr Sivathanu Pillai outlined the need for a national Nano Technology Mission, Dr Naoki Ikezawa outlined how accurate information and forecast to stake holders could prove valuable to steer the mission. He illustrated it with patent heat map of Fullerene( nano material) in Japanese regions over time and how policy makers were able to create enablers around them. This presentation was backed up by a Day 2 Session by Hideki Murayama San of Frontier Carbon Corporation who talked about how they started Fullerene production at industrial scale and brought down the prices from US $7000 per gram to $5 a gram over a decade.

Tetsuya Kaneko san of Nomura further highlighted that nano tech for Japan is a survival strategy. Nano technology as an enabler that will touch all industries rather than exist as standalone industry was explained with an excellent metaphor: salt like tech and rice like tech. Salt is not visible in the food as such, but it has significant impact on the food similarly nano tech will not be visible yet pervade across industries. Unlike rice like tech say like iron and steel or IC chip industry which is very visible and bounded.

The sincerity for partnership with India on nano tech was very evident from the Japanese team facilitated by Nomura/Dr Naoki Ikezawa san. Keneko san was outlining where Japanese nano tech is strong and where there are collaboration opportunities. For instance, bio-nano tech with health care focus is not a strength of Japanese nano-tech industry, whereas nano-tech for sensors, measuring instruments with applications in electronics, computer, automobile industry there is definite leadership.

Each of the partnership/opportunity area mentioned was backed up by a presentation by experts from the specific field. Be it presentation by Masahiro Takemura san of National Institute for Materials Science- Japan, on Japan, Nanotechnology activities, or Denso Corp Nobuaki Kawahara san’s presentation on Automobile and MEMS, or Takashi Tomita san of Sharp Corp on Nanotechnology and Future of Evolution of Photovoltaic, or Hodeyuki Matsuoka san of Hitachi Ltd’s presentation on Research on spintronics at Hitachi, or Hideki Murayama san’s presentation on Fullerene or Tatsuaki Ataka san of Olympus Corp on Micro-nano Technology in Olympus, the underlying openness for partnership was the common thread.

Come to think of it, the initial presentation by Nomura and the subsequent presentations by other Japanese companies were statement complete – as in a patent draft – key concepts referred in the patent are defined somewhere within the patent document. It is just amazing how a handful of people from very large organizations are able to present themselves as cohesive team.

Here is the picture of Dr Naoki Ikezawa San along with Dr Shri Sivathanu Pillai. Photo courtesy The Hindu.

Also in the picture is Neeru Dhall able and deft Japanese-English Interpreter. She runs a consultancy company called Trans-Wel out of Delhi specializing on Research, Coordination, Interpretation and Translation service. Her appropriate informality and general (radiating of ) people empathy was impressive. Neeru, hat-tip for bridging the cultural and language barrier!

Here is my 2 cents on how the Indo-Japanese cooperation and how future conclave could be made more effective(Read what was oddly missing):

1) Layering was missing. In a conclave where wide range of people come together, there were no thumb rule to distinguish between present and the future, research and technology, engineering vs ready to use product.

2) Clearcut entry points for small businesses, and SME pointers were missing. Indeed, if nano-tech has to take off in a big way, the big players like the Japanese companies will have to transform themselves as platform players and actively encourage co-creation by much smaller players. If Amazon could do it effectively for IT infrastructure with Amazon Web Services, why not in other infrastructure intensive domains? Opensource techniques could to be explored to open up non-core patents and non-core infrastructures, thereby reducing entry barriers and increasing spurt in growth.

3) Risk capital opportunities and exits are not outlined. Risk capital and entrepreneurial action are key ingredients for disruption. And without disruption, even nano-tech will be pretty much boring .

4) Entry for small and micro players through trading and service opportunities are to be outlined to make the ecosystem more vibrant.

Overall, the Indo-Japanese initiative is very promising and the Japanese sincerity is to be matched and cultivated by the Indian industry and other stakeholders. Hats off CII for facilitating the initiative!

Nano Tech Conclave: I-CanNano: Dr Arup Chatterjee- The Infosys of Nano?

The most inspiring session at Nano Tech Conclave was the talk by Dr Arup Chatterjee CEO, I-CANNano.

I-CanNano’s success story thus far is a case of applying cutting edge technology to an age old commodity product – the humble paint and coatings. The fundamental change in material characteristics translates as benefits like scratch resistance, less corrosion, longer life etc. At the coating front, the automotive glass coated with I-CanNano coating makes it more transparent under rain conditions. The water droplets run off due to the smoothness of the surface thereby increasing the clarity.

They have applied their nano material knowledge to fine tune different properties like, transparency, thermal or electrical conductivity, corrosion resistance, scratch resistance, etc and perfected the production method to industrial scale.

Interestingly, they undertake collaborative contract research too. This is a good thing, they are not stuck with product mindset or too carried away by service mindset( the bane of IT boom). Surely I-CanNano and its founder Dr Arup Chatterjee are worth watching and tracking. His team is poised to be the Infosys of Indian nano-tech!

Nano Technology Conclave: Wake up to Nano-revolution: Dr Sivatanu Pillai Keynote

I was invited to be part of Nano Technology Conclave 2008 organized by Tamil Nadu Technology Development & Promotion Centre, CII, and Department of Science and Technology, in association with Nomura Research Institute Japan. The highlight of the inaugural session was keynote address by Dr A Sivathanu Pillai, Chief Controller R&D – DRDO and CEO of BrahMos.

The keynote covered the entire spectrum of Nano Technology from present scene to future projections touching wide ranging industries and concerns. Here is a glimpse into some that caught my attention. I’ve categorized them into five broad areas to make my understanding easier:

Dr Sivathanu Pillai caught the attention of experts and novice alike by illustrating the charm of Nano-technology using peacock feather as an example of nature’s won nano-particles at play making vivid colors. Then quickly got on to estimates for 2015 when Nano Tech will be ~ One Trillion Dollar business by conservative estimates and ~ $ 3T by libral estimates. Nano boom is set to coincide with the convergence of Information Technology, Bio-technology and Nano tech advances, with growth estimates at 50% CAGR beating the growth rate of IT and BT at ~35% and 25% respectively. Even if you take it with a pinch of salt, the numbers are just amazing.

If quantitative estimates did not sweep you, the qualitative potential will:
Nano materials and their disruptive potential

Right from the day to day dress material to aerospace materials will be re-looked and redone to incorporate nano-tech advances. A nano-particle coating on dress material will make them stain and dust resistant – changing the concept of washing them.

A shoe made of nano-material will enable a person to walk faster!?

Displays, all kinds of coating, chemicals in short all thing manufactured will be touched by nano revolution.

MEMS and nano fabrication has a lot of disruptive potential too.

Nano Technology and Health care
Natural bone surface is a nano-surface, Tissue engineering is more effective with nano-technology.

Integrated drug delivery can change the fundamentals of medical science: Cancer can be detected at very early stage and cured early. A glucose sensor and insulin delivery system could manage a diabetics insulin levels automatically.

Magnetic nano-particles along with cunning use of magnetic field can be used as localization tool that can bring down side effects significantly.

Nano technologies impact on social engineering, governance
Nano membranes has huge potential for drinking water purification. In the future, it will be possible to filter out harmful viruses like polio virus using a nano-filter. This has huge implications in terms of water security.

Certain disabilities like blindness and deafness can be overcome using bio-chip implants. There was even a video of Parkinson disease patient implanted with bio-chip while awake, and instantly gaining motor skills.

Nano technology can be used in pollution control. Even heavy metals could be filtered out!

Counter terrorism, bio-warfare weapon detection, carbon nano-fibers based radars can help stealth and counter stealth efforts. Similarly smart carbon dust could help survive a nuclear attack.
Nano technology and energy security
Energy security is one very promising area where nano-tech is on the verge of playing a crucial role. Firstly, the renewable energy solar cells can be made more efficient, and cheaper with nano-materials. Fuel cells is another very promising area.

At personal level power generating dress is possible with TiO2 coating on the dress. Similarly rechargeable batteries are set to see revolutionary high performance.

Lighting applications of nano-materials could save upto 10 percent of energy.

Nano technology Startrek Sci-Fi reality culture
The following stuck me as straight out of Sci-Fi:
Bio-chip implant, molecular robots that will co-operate to seek and destroy viruses within the body( a futuristic video clip was shown to this effect), cheaper faster space travel.
Life span increase with Artery cleaning and such exotic medical applications. Molecular level self replicating bionic ‘bots.

Dr Sivathanu Pillai further outlined that more than 2 million knowledge workers are needed for nano-tech. He further lamented that while papers are getting published, conferences are held, there is no concerted effort towards global nano-technology leadership. On the industry side for instance, DRDO is forced to get into manufacturing certain materials, whereas the industry could do it and re-purpose the same things for consumer and medical applications. The industry is yet to wake up and invest in a big way. The academic is not fully ready yet. A mission mode approach is to be put in place with a full reputed mission director.

We better wake up to this nano-revolution lest we miss it just like we missed the industrial revolution.

Sundararajan – Director ARCI, Dr Naoki Ikezawa – Chief Industry Specialist Nomura Research Institute, V Aiyagiri Rao Adviser DST, Bill Dobson – Director Ontario Industrial Research Assistance Program, A Nagarajan IAS, Princiapl Sec Planning and Development TN Govt, Anjan Das, Head Technology, IPR, TDC’s CII presented at the inaugural session. This post has already overshot its length to include them here.

Overall it was very educative and inspiring!