What is nanomedicine

Nanomedicine is a subfield of nanotechnology. It is often defined as the repair,construction and control of human biological systems using devicesbuilt upon nanotechnology standards. Basically, nanomedicine is themedical application of nanotechnology. Nanostructured materials,engineered enzymes and many other products of biotechnology will bevery useful in the future. Of course, the full potential ofnanomedicine is unlikely to arrive until after complex,high-sofisticated, medically programmable nanomachines and nanorobotsare developed. When that happens, every medical doctor’s dream willbecome reality. Having robots fabricated to nanometer precision (1nanometer = 1 bilionth of a meter) will allow medical doctors toapproach the human body at the cellular and molecular levels.Interventions such as repairing damaged tissues (bone, muscle, nerve)will be possible.


We all know that the mankind is still fighting against many complexillnesses like cancer, multiple sclerosis, cardiovascular diseases,Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, diabetes as well as someinflammatory or infectious diseases (i.e. HIV). Nanotechnology raiseshopes and expectations for millions of patients that suffer from thosediseases. For example, it is expected that doctors will be able todestroy the very first cancer cells and so stop the disease fromgrowing.


Nanomedicine is a huge industry. Sales reached 6.8 billion dollars in 2004.Significant amounts of money are being invested in research – USA andEuropean Union are investing billions of dollars and plan to investmore in the future.


NIH established eight nanomedicine development centers which are staffed bymultidisciplinary research teams including biologists, physicians,mathematicians, engineers and computer scientists. The intial phase oftheir program is directed towards gathering extensive information aboutthe properties of nanoscale biological elements. This is very importantand will help scientists to correct defects in unhealthy cells. Thesecond phase has been approved recently and is directed towardsapplying the knowledge from the first phase in treating diseases.


European Technology Platform is a platforum formed by 53 European stakeholders.Their first task the group had was to write a vision document onnanotechnology in which experts describe the extrapolation of needsuntil 2020.


There are three key priorities in the future: nanotechnology-baseddiagnostics and imaging, targeted drug delivery and release andregenerative medicine.

According to the journal „Nature Materials“, there are over 130 nanotech-baseddrugs and delivery systems developed worldwide. Nanomedicine industryis expected continue to grow and have a significant impact on theeconomy.

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Dr Vishnu Kiran Manam

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