Activists are again hopping mad about the paltry sums given to research into the health and safety implications of nanotechnology, this time $4 million form the US Environmental Protection Agency.
It seems to us that $4 million could buy a lot of rats and nanotubes.
As always, its not the size, but what you do with it. A coordinated program of research, preferably based around a specific institute, which may ot may not be virtual depending on the academic politics and budgets available, and a series of well controlled and standardised studies (for example to repeat the same experiment with single wall nanotubes or carbon nanofibres, varying both the total surface area per dose and the mass) would result in a far greater understanding of the potential hazards, if any.
Concentrating on, amd increasing our knowledge of these specific issues would also allow us to move away from the attitude in some quarters that nanotechnology is dangerous (we suppose these people are also terrified of chemistry), and focus on the real issues.