Nanotechnology for a Sustainable World

Book excerpt: Does humanity have a moral obligation to emphasise nanotechnology's role in addressing the critical public health and environmental problems of our age? This well crafted book explores this idea by analysing the prospects for a macroscience nanotechnology-for-environmental sustainability project in areas such as food, water and energy supply, medicine, healthcare, peace and security. Developing and applying an innovative science-based view of natural law underpinning a global social contract, it considers some of the key scientific and governance challenges such a global project may face. The book concludes that the moral culmination of nanotechnology is a Global Artificial Photosynthesis project. It argues that the symmetric patterns of energy creating photosynthesis, life and us are shaping not only the nanotechnological advances of artificial photosynthesis, but also the ethical and legal norms likely to best govern such scientific achievements to form a sustainable existence on this planet. Nanotechnology for a Sustainable World will appeal to many generations of scientists and policymakers working to improve our world in public health, environmental sustainability and renewable energy and nanotechnology. It will also be a valuable resource for similarly motivated students of chemistry, physics, biology, nanotechnology and photosynthesis, as well as environmental and energy ethics, law and policy.