Slowing the nanotechnology treadmill: impact science versus production science for sustainable technological development

Nanotechnology is promoted as a solution to problems as diverse as world hunger, energy dependence, and environmental degradation. Nanotechnology research aims to provide new materials, production processes, and military and commercial applications that will transform social relations and economies. While some view nanotechnology as advancing ecological modernization, this analysis of science funding structures, priorities, and institutional goals raises the concern that the past decade of nanotechnology investment has served to accelerate the Treadmill of Production. The transnational race to develop nanotechnological capacity provides an opportunity to examine how scientific potential is developed and unleashed, and to what ends. Investment patterns in nanotechnology research demonstrate an emphasis on production science, and relatively little attention to impact science aimed at understanding the environmental and public health risks nanotechnology may pose. The result of that skewed allocation of research dollars is that nanotechnology research, which might be harnessed to improve sustainability, has instead decreased the capacity of social systems to comprehend and respond to changes in ecosystems.