Research PaperNanotechnology patenting in China and Germany – a comparison ofpatent landscapes by bibliographic analyses
Nina Preschitschek and Dominic Bresser
Identifying the emerging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors
Steffen Kanzler
Knowledge sharing in heterogeneous collaborations – a longitudinal in-vestigation of a cross-cultural research collaboration in nanoscience
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo and Alan L. Porter 15
31
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Technology trajectories and multidimensional impacts: further remarkson the nanotechnology industryPaulo Antônio Zawislak, Luis FernandoMarques, Priscila Esteves andFernanda Rublescki 47
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For some time now the ‘nano-topic’ has been a big issue in academia and industry alike.We nowhave the ability to measure phenomena at the ‘nano-scale’ and to synthesize ‘nano-materials’ withcompletely different characteristics. This leads not only to new scientific achievements, but also tocreating more value for companies active in the ‘nano-field’. Those who expected the ‘nano-hype’ tobe short-lived obviously erred. As an interdisciplinary trigger for biology, chemistry, engineeringand physics, nanotechnology has been installed as a scientific discipline in its own right. It is spar-king new solutions in many technological developments. Furthermore, researchers around theglobe are working in promising nanotechnology collaboration projects to solve the challenges of ourtime in a sustainable way. Although our Special Issue can only cover a small part of this vast disci-pline, it is aiming at transmitting some of this spark to our readers as well.
In the first article of this Special Issue, Nina Preschitschek and Dominic Bresser compare the pa-tent situation in China and Germany. In their article “Nanotechnology patenting in China and Ger-many – a comparison of patent landscapes by bibliographic analyses”, they identify historical trendsin nanotechnology patenting. Additionally, the authors present an overview of the most active pa-tenting institutions and the emerging fields in both countries. Finally, they derive some implicati-ons for German-Chinese collaboration projects in nanotechnology.
In a second research article, Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo and Alan L. Porter also use bi-bliographic studies to identify emerging research paths. Their contribution “Identifying the emer-ging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors” provides additional insights in the existing researchnetworks, identifying single researchers as well as research schools. The authors use nanoparticlesin biosensors as an illustrative example for their study.
Steffen Kanzler builds on this background of network research in his article “Knowledge sharingin heterogeneous collaborations – a longitudinal investigation of a cross-cultural research colla-boration in nanoscience”. Especially crucial in collaboration projects, Steffen Kanzler examinesknowledge sharing behavior with the example of the research collaboration SFB TRR 61. This firstChinese- German SFB is funded by the German Research Foundation and the National Natural Sci-ence Foundation of China. In his study, he sheds new light on cultural and personal influence factorsof Chinese-German collaboration.
The last article of this Special Issue “Technological trajectories and multidimensional impacts:further remarks on the nanotechnology industry” by Paulo Antônio Zawislak, Luis FernandoMar-ques, Priscila Esteves and Fernanda Rublescki deals with effects of nanotechnology on different sta-keholders. In their interview study, they present and evaluate opportunities and risks of thistechnology. They conclude that a regulatory framework is necessary to allow an exploitation of thefull potential of nanotechnology.
Now, please enjoy reading the first issue of the seventh volume of the JoBC. We would like tothank all authors and reviewers who have contributed to this new issue. If you have any commentsor suggestions, please do not hesitate to send us an email at [email protected].
The definition of nanotechnologyused by theEuropean Patent Office (EPO) reflects its charac-ter of being a bridging technology:
The termnanotechnology covers entitieswitha geometrical size of at least one functional com-ponent below 100 nanometers in one or moredimensions susceptible ofmaking physical, che-mical or biological effects available which areintrinsic to that size. It covers equipment andmethods for controlled analysis, manipulation,processing, fabricationormeasurementwithpre-cision below 100 nanometers.
Beneath the definition of the EPO, there areseveral otheronesavailable,e.g. fromtheUSNatio-nalNanotechnology Initiative (NNI) or aworkingdefinition of the International Standard Organi-zation (ISO). While all these definitions differ intheprecisewording, they all underline three cha-racteristics of nanotechnology. Firstly,nanotech-
nology focusesonmaterials orprocesses forwhichminimumone component of nanometer-scale isinvolved.Secondly, the control,handlingandmani-pulating at this very small scale is emphasized.This excludes all “accidental” nanotechnologywhich can be also described as “natural” nano-technology and occurswithout any engineeringor functionalizing process step. Thirdly, the com-mercialization aspect is highlighted in all defini-tions. Nanotechnology enables new industrialapplications as well as technological innovati-ons. In addition, the convergent character ofnano-technology is pointed out. Some nanotechnolo-gical innovations are used among various scien-tific disciplines and industry application fields.This can consequently lead to the fusion of nano-technology and adjacent scientific disciplines,likemodernbiotechnologyand information tech-nology (OECD, 2009).
Since the 1980s, nanotechnology has develo-ped from a research field, only known among
Research SectionNanotechnology patenting in China and Ger-many – a comparison of patent landscapes bybibliographic analyses
Nina Preschitschek* and Dominic Bresser **
This article gives a general overview on the patent landscapes of China and Ger-manywithin the emerging field of nanotechnology.A keyword based search,usingthe search term “nano”, on SciFinder Scholar™ for the time period of 1985 to 2007leads to 51,490patent references overall and 12,979 Chinese and 2,901Germanonesrespectively. Bibliographic analyses focus on the historical trends in nanotechno-logypatenting aswell as onmajor patent applicants, technological fields and inter-national patenting strategies in China andGermany.They illustrate an above-ave-rage growth rate in nanotechnology patents for China, but a rather below-avera-ge one for Germany. Major differences in regard to the role of universities andresearch institutes in applied research and therefore as patent applicants are simi-larly emphasized as diverging international patenting strategies. Implications forfuture Chinese-German collaborations in applied nanotechnology research andpotential improvements for future analyses are discussed.
* University of Muenster, NRWGraduate School of Chemistry and Institute of Business Adminis-tration at the Department of Chemistry and Pharmacy, Leonardo-Campus 1, 48149Muenster, Ger-many, [email protected]
** University of Muenster, Institute of Business Administration at the Department of Chemistryand Pharmacy, Leonardo-Campus 1, 48149Muenster, Germany, [email protected]
Nanotechnology patenting in China and Germany – a comparison of patent land-scapes by bibliographic analyses
3
experts, to one of the most promising researchfieldswith especially high impact on research inphysics, chemistry and biology. The global mar-ket of nanotechnology is forecasted to reachingup toUSD 150-3,100 billion during thenext years,possibly leadingup to 2million jobs globally. Thehigh capacity of nanotechnology is derived fromits various implications and applications on verydifferent industries, ranging from manufactu-ring over life sciences to traditional industrieslike electronics or textiles (OECD, 2009).
In regard to the forecasted outstandingmar-ket volume and broad spectrumof scientific andapplication fields nanotechnology is affecting,there is consensus among experts that it is a key-technology of the 21st century. As a result, thecompetence of countries achieved in nanotech-nology is used as a benchmark for a country’stechnological competence.Considering nationalR&Dexpenditures aswell as thenumber of scien-tific publications and patents, the United States,Japan andmain European countries like Germa-ny,UKandFrance, canbe identified asmainplay-ers in nanotechnology (Liu et al., 2009; OECD,2009).However,Asian countries, especially Chinaand Korea, have increased their investments inthenanotechnology sector,both frompublic aut-horities aswell as fromprivate enterprises (BMBF,2009). This results in high growth-rates of scien-tific publications andpatent applications. Regar-ding the number of scientific publications bet-ween 1991 and 2007, China has already outper-formedGermanyand Japan,nowbeingat 2nd posi-tion, right behind theUSA (OECD, 2009). Thoughthe quality of Chinese publications seems to bestill at a low level, this development indicates thatChinawill playakey role innanotechnology-rela-ted R&Dduring thenext years (Michelson,2008).Therefore,Chinawill becomeahighly importantcollaborative and strategic partner for other, alsoalready established countrieswithin the field ofnanotechnology in the future (Shapira andWang,2009).
The first academic Chinese-German researchcollaboration on Nanoscience, the “Transregio-nal CollaborativeResearchCentre”(TRR61)1, estab-lished in 2008, already affords researchers fromboth,ChinaandGermany, the opportunity to con-duct fundamental research within the field ofnanotechnology in close collaboration. But inregard to the transfer of research results from thiscollaborative fundamental research to appliedresearch within the two different systems in
China andGermany, there are still best practicesmissing. Especially in China, some lags in thecommercialization of results from nanotechno-logy researchexist (AppelbaumandParker,2008).Moreover, the research systems of the respecti-ve countries significantly differ, e.g. in the influ-ence of the government on research orientationor in research funding. In this context,we consi-der that it is of high importance to get an over-viewon the patent landscapes in nanotechnolo-gy in China andGermany.On the onehand, suchan analysiswill deliver insight into the degree ofinnovativeness andapplicationorientationof therespective countries.On theotherhand,the resultsmay be used to develop a best-practicemodel, sothat collaborations between Chinese and Ger-man researchers will also be successfully con-ducted at the level of applied research in future.Therefore,we aim to give an overview on paten-ting behavior in China andGermany, particular-ly focusing on historical trends in nanotechno-logy, the importance of private enterprises, uni-versities and research institutes as patent appli-cants in the respective country as well as majorfields of patentingwithin thebroad field of nano-technology and general patenting strategies.
The remainder of this article is structured asfollows. In the next section,wewill describe theresearch landscape in China with special focuson the role of theChinese government in fundingresearch. Afterwards, we will briefly introducethe Chinese as well as the German patent law.These information will account for the analysisof the differences revealed in nanopatenting inChina and Germany. Then,wewill demonstratethe use of patent data to generally describe thecurrent status of technology systems. Based onthis, the researchdesignwill be explained indetailand major results will be presented and discus-sed. Finally,wewill draw conclusions, includinga critical reviewof our research design aswell asthe impact of the derived results for furtherresearch within this or similar fields.
2 Research and development in China
Up to 1977, just like in other socialist countries,Chinese research,development and engineeringactivities were centralized and administrativelycoordinated by the government. Thus, researchanddevelopment (R&D)was concentrated at uni-versities and research institutions. The results ofR&D were again disseminated by the govern-
1) Participants in the TRR 61 are the University of Münster (Germany), the Centre for Nanotechnology (CeNTech), the Centre for Nonlinear Science (CeNoS), the Tsinghua Universi-ty (Beijing, China), the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), the Interdisciplinary Research Centre for Cooperative Functional Systems (FOKUS) and the Chinese National Centrefor NanoScience & Technology (NCNST, Beijing/China).
4
ment to business enterprises in order to commer-cialize the inventions. Furthermore, the govern-ment controlled every operational decision, likepricing, investment or distribution,made by cor-porations, and supervised the R&D activitiesundertaken byuniversities and research institu-tions.
However, at the end of the 1970s the govern-ment realized that the system had failed and –also due to Deng Xiaoping’s Open Door Policy –great efforts were undertaken to decentralizeR&D and engineering. One major goal was thatuniversities and research institutions shouldbeco-memore autonomic in order to achieve interna-tional competitive research results by collabora-tion with domestic and foreign business enter-prises as well as other universities and researchinstitutes. Additionally, the absorption capacityof corporations for the universities R&D outputshould be enhanced. To achieve this goal, a set ofeconomic andadministrative reformswere adop-ted leading to a decrease of the government’sdirect control over corporations,universities andresearch institutions. Moreover, those reformsincluded the implementation of market-basedresource allocationmechanisms, the introducti-on of a patent systemaswell as the creation of aregulatory framework for private-owned corpo-rations and spin-offs from universities (Guan etal., 2005; Liefner and Kroll, 2007; Liu and White,2001).
But still today, R&D sponsorship, e.g. the 863program, ismainly fundedby theChinesegovern-ment. By these investments, the political leader-ship of China tries to focus R&Donhigh-techno-logy sectors like biotechnology or nanotechnolo-gy, offering great market potential and gettinghigh strategic importance, in order to achieve aleading positionwithin these emerging techno-logical fields (Appelbaum and Parker, 2008). Incomparison to other industrialized countries, theChinese government still substantially affects itsdomestic innovation system.This is also reflectedin the large proportion of R&Doutput, like publi-cations and especially patents, generated byuni-versities and research institutions (Guan et al.,2005; Liu andWhite, 2001).
3 Chinese patent system
Since the foundation of the People’s Republicof China in 1949, the Chinese legal system, inclu-ding regulations for intellectual property, hasleant on that of other socialist systems. Inventi-ons and innovations were owned by the state,whereas the actual inventors were awarded bygetting certificates.Hence, all inventions aswell
as all related technologies were available for allcorporations, free for personal aswell as commer-cial use (Frietsch and Wang, 2007; Steinmann,1992).
However, at the end of the 1970s, China lag-ged far behind industrial nations in economicand technological development. Inorder tomoder-nize China's industry and technology sector, theChinese government and especially Deng Xiao-ping pursued, as already mentioned above, anOpen Door Policy, having realized the necessityof foreign investmentsand technological knowled-ge (Liu andWhite, 2001; Steinmann, 1992). Beingaware of the fact that foreign companies wouldnot transfer their technological knowledge toChinawithout offering legal protection for theirintellectual property great effortswere underta-ken to rapidly introduce a patent system guidedby international standards (Steinmann, 1992).Thus, in 1980 the Chinese Patent Administrationwas founded and in 1982 the first Chinese Trade-mark Act was approved. In 1985, China accededto the World Intellectual Property Organization(WIPO) and theChinese Patent Lawcame in force,developed in close collaboration with the Ger-man Patent Office. For this reason, the Chinesepatent system is very similar to theGermanone.Evennowadays,Chinese courts gear to rulings ofGerman courts in issues of patent law (FrietschandWang,2007; Liu andWhite, 2001;Steinmann,1992).
After two revisions of the Chinese patent lawin 1992 and 2000, state-owned corporations areno longer privileged andpharmaceutical, chemi-cal or alimentary inventions – in former timesexcluded frompatent protection - canbe filed forpatent application. In 1998, the former ChinesePatentAdministrationwas renamed to the StateIntellectual PropertyOffice (SIPO). In 2002,Chinatook another big step forward on itsway to inter-nationalize its economic and patent system bybecoming amember of theWorld Trade Organi-zation (WTO) and acceding to the Agreement onTrade-Related Aspects of Intellectual PropertyRights (TRIPS) (Chen et al., 2007; Frietsch andWang, 2007; Steinmann, 1992).
4 German patent system
The first Germanpatent lawwas approved in1877.Up to this time, inventors had only receivedprivileges by the governing sovereign, a legalentitlement to protection of inventions and inno-vations did not exist. In 1891 and again in 1936,German patent law underwent major revisions.Patent protection for processeswas changed andutilitymodels were introduced in order to grant
Nanotechnology patenting in China and Germany – a comparison of patentlandscapes by bibliographic analyses
5
protection even formore trivial and economical-ly less important inventions. In 1949, theGermanPatent and TradeMark Office (DPMA)was foun-ded in Munich and the former Patent Office inBerlin lost its status as head. In the course of theharmonization of the European patent systemsand theEuropeanPatentConvention (EPC) of 1973,theGermanpatent lawwasultimately reformedin 1981, creating the present legal version (Kra-ßer, 2009).
In Germany, just as well as in China, inventi-ons for which patent protection is applied haveto complywith three requirements:novelty, inven-tiveness and practical applicability. Noveltyimplies that the invention must not have beenpublished or used anywhere else in the world.Inventiveness means that the invention is neit-her already state of the art nor an obvious resultof its application. Practical applicability standsfor at least thepossibility of commercial producti-onanduseof theobject of invention.Patent appli-cations are examined according to these formalrequirements andpublished 18months after ini-tial filing. In some cases, the substantial exami-nation, which is required for the final grantingof patent protection, can even take several years.A granted patent then protects an invention fora maximum of 20 years (Kraßer, 2009).
5 Patents as indicators for technolo-gical analyses
The analysis of bibliometric indicators, deri-ved frompublicationandpatent references, repre-sents an efficient method to illustrate, compareand evaluate research activities both in a speci-fic established thematic area and in an emergingsector, like nanotechnology (Allencar et al., 2007).Whereas the analysis of scientific publicationsoffers an evaluation of the quality of a country’sresearch capabilitywithin a certain field, the ana-lysis of patent data is regarded to be one of thebestmethods of quantifying the output of a tech-nology system (Debackere et al., 2002). The num-ber of patents an institution or a country ownscan be taken as a measure for its technologicalknowledge and vigorwithin the respective field(Allencar et al., 2007). Since thenumber of patentscoheres with the output of industrial R&D andother innovative activities, currently abetter indi-cator for this measurement intention does notexist.
In detail, the advantages that patent indica-tors offer as measures of technological activityare their world-wide geographical coverage aswell as their coverageofnearly every field of tech-nology. Moreover, patent documents contain
various bibliographic data, e.g. date of publicati-on, names of inventors and applicants or techni-cal classifications, which are all largely free oferrors due to the status of patents being legaldocuments. Not least, their easy and large-scaleavailability through patent databases leads tothe fact that patents are more widely used thanany other innovation indicator to assess techno-logical progress. Nevertheless, taking patents asindicators of technological progress also bringssome biases about. Not every patent is of hightechnological or economical value. Furthermore,there are differences among the various natio-nal patent systems, regarding legal aswell as eco-nomic and cultural factors, e.g. the ‘home advan-tage’ effect or the different definition of the term‘inventor’ (Debackere et al., 2002).
Within the field of nanotechnology, severalstudies aim to measure technological progressusingbibliometric indicators (Alencar et al., 2007;Liu et al., 2009). Since nanotechnology is still anemerging technology, just being right at the verybeginning of its life-cycle, the number of scienti-fic publications exceeds the number of patentsconsiderably. So, a high number of studies focuson analyzing scientific publications. But due to asubstantial increase in patent applications sincethemid of the 1990s, patent analyses offer someimportant insights for the understanding of cur-rent and future developmentswithin the field ofnanotechnology, e.g. the identification of majorplayers or the evaluation of different patentingstrategies.
6 Research methodology
There are several studies available analyzingpatent landscapes of different countries withinthe field of nanotechnology (Alencar et al., 2007;Huang et al., 2006;Li et al., 2007;OECD,2007). Pre-vious to the analysis of patent landscapes,on theone hand it is of high importance to select suit-able databases and on the other hand to definekeywords covering all facets of the respectiveresearch field to preferably conduct entire sear-ches.
Whereas numerous studies conduct searchesaccessing only one single patent database, e.g.the database of the United States Patent andTrademarkOffice (USPTO) or the one of the Euro-pean PatentOffice (EPO), fewer onesmakeuse ofdatabases containing data from several nationaland international patent offices, like the Chemi-cal Abstracts (CA) database (Huang et al., 2006;Liu et al., 2009;OECD,2007). Since first preexami-nations suggest that ahigh shareofChinesenano-technology patents was only applied at the Chi-
nese patent office,but international applicationswere nearly completely missed, we decide toemploy a patent database containing data fromseveral patent offices.Accordingly,we choose Sci-Finder Scholar™ for our analysis. SciFinder Scho-lar™ is a research discovery tool, offering accessto approximately 50 million documents frommore than 10,000 relevant scientific journals aswell as 59 patent authorities, focusing on diver-se chemical-related scientific fields.Havingdirectaccess tonanotechnology-related references fromallmajor patent authorities via this database,weconducted a keyword-based search to generate adataset of nanotechnology patents.
In regard to the selection of keywords cove-ring all facets of nanotechnology, there are a cou-ple of scientific articles refining search terms fornanotechnology (Alencar et al., 2007; Kostoff etal., 2005; Porter et al., 2008). In most cases, theroot search term is“nano”,augmentedwith addi-tional search terms, e.g. quantum or self-assem-bly. The authors argue that such an enlargedsearch algorithm is necessary to conduct entiresearches and simultaneously to avoid the inclu-sionofnon-relevant references.For instance, thereare certain terms co-occurringwith“nano”whichare of high relevance, like “atomic force micros-copy”, but also somewith less relevance like theverygeneral“silicon”.Of course, these searchalgo-rithms afford the creation of datasets characte-rized by high precision and recall (Porter et al.,2008).But then, those searches are very time con-suming and not easily to conduct. As we aim togive a general overview on the nanotechnologypatent landscapes in China and Germany withspecial focus on differences in patenting beha-vior of these two countries,we decide to concen-trate on employing“nano”as single search termfor the creation of our dataset, having in mindthat this does not lead to an all-embracing cha-racterization of the respective patent landscapes.
For this reason, we focus on general trendsinstead of absolute numbers for the followinganalyses.Nevertheless, a keyword-based search,conducted byHuang et al., shows that themajo-rityof references is obtainedbysolelyusing“nano”as search term, since 91%of all patent referenceswere identified.Due to this and in considerationof our research aim, we opt for this researchdesign, which is characterized on the one handby accessing data from a high number of vario-us patent offices, but on the other hand by focu-sing on one single search term.
Since nanotechnology represents a researchfield, just emerging at the beginning of the 1980sandadditionally theChinese patent system in itscontemporary constitution was not established
until 1985,we limited our search to patent docu-mentspublishedbetween 1985 and2007.We scanthe patent full-texts,which led to 51,490 relevantpatent references worldwide. In a second step,we extracted those patent references applied byminimum one German or Chinese private per-son, institution or enterprise. Hence, 2,901 Ger-manand 12,979Chinese patent references remai-ned, building two separate data sets. By usingthese two datasets,wewere able to analyze andcompare the patent landscapes as well as thepatenting behaviors in Germany and Chinawit-hin the field of nanotechnology. In addition, wegenerate twomore separate datasets, containingpatents fromJapanand theUnitedStates respecti-vely, since these two countries are so far consi-deredas technological leaders in the field ofnano-technology (Huang et al. 2004).
7 Results and discussion
First of all, we will present a historical trendby patent publication dates for nanopatentingover the period of 1985 to 2007. Following thisgeneral overview, we will present major resultsregarding the patent landscapes of China andGermany in nanotechnology. Analyzing majorapplicants in each country emphasizes themaindifferences in nanotechnology patenting bet-ween the respective countries.Moreover,wepointout the core areas of each country within thebroad field of nanotechnology. Finally, we brief-ly comment onpatent strategies regardingnatio-nal versus international patenting.
77..11 HHiissttoorriiccaall ttrreenndd
Though it is recommended to use the priori-ty year for the analysis of historical trends inpatenting, since this leads to a more accuratepicture of time when research actually took place,we employ the publication date of the respecti-ve patent for our analysis (Wilson, 1987). The rea-son for this approach originates from the fact thatonly the publication year of the respective patentis available via SciFinder Scholar™. In figure 1, thehistorical trend in nanopatenting is depicted,whereas we analyzed this trend for all patents(worldwide) as well as for selected countries. Astrong increase in the number of patents can beidentified at the beginning of the 2000s, risingfrom about 1,100 patents in 2000 to more than11,000 in 2007. The average annual growth ratefor this period amounts to 34%. Considering thehistorical trends in nanopatenting of the UnitedStates, Japan, China and Germany, the rapidgrowth rate of Chinese patents is especially remar-
Nanotechnology patenting in China and Germany – a comparison of patent land-scapes by bibliographic analyses
7
kable. For the period of 2000 to 2007, it accountsfor 49%. Since 2005, China exceeds Japan and theUnited States, formerly representing the techno-logical leaders in nanotechnology, regarding theabsolute number of patents. The number of Ger-
man patents remains relatively low for the wholeconsidered time period. The annual growth rateaverages out at 15%. In regard to our researchobjective, we can assert that China holds a con-siderable higher amount of patents within the
2) For 2002 the dataset was adjusted: 941 patents were applied by one Chinese private person to protect a variety of different medicinal herbs. Since such a singular incident dis-tort the analysis regarding the general trend of nanotechnology patenting in China, we decide to exclude these references.
Figure 2 Comparison of patent applicants clusters. Number of patents: 50,549. Source: SciFinder Scholar™, November2009.
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%Individuals Industry Research Institutes Universities
Germany China
Nina Preschitschek and Dominic Bresser
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field of nanotechnology compared to Germany.Especially the high growth rate indicates thatChina will play a key role within this sector duringthe next years.
77..22 PPaatteenntt aapppplliiccaannttss
SciFinder Scholar™ also provides the oppor-tunity to analyze the patent applicants withinthe patent datasets. In a first step, we cluster thepatent applicants into 4 groups (universities,research institutes, industry and individuals) todemonstrate a key difference in nanopatentingbetween China and Germany, which is origina-ted in the respective role of universities and indus-try in nanopatenting (see figure 2).
Whereas universities are the dominant patentapplicants in China, owning 43% of all patents,in Germany 66% of all patents are owned by
industry. Patenting of research institutes is near-ly on the same level in both countries. However,in China the main part of these patents is pos-sessed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (66%of overall 2,078 patents). With regard to the shareof patents assigned by individuals, there can beidentified a significantly higher amount for Chinathan for Germany. The dominant role of univer-sities in nanopatenting in China is also reflectedin the analysis of the Top 10 of patent applicantsin nanotechnology (see table 1). Whereas the Chi-nese Academy of Sciences, including all associa-ted institutes, holds overall 1,368 patents withinnanotechnology and consequently represents themost active nanopatenting institution in China,eight universities, but only one private enterpri-se are to be found in this Top 10 listing. Overall,these TOP 10 patent applicants account for about25% of all patents determined for China in nano-
Table 1 Top 10 of patent applicants in China (1985-2007). Source: SciFinder Scholar™, November 2009.
Rank Applicant Number of patents Percentage of all patents1 Chinese Academy of Sciences 1,368 10.5%2 Tsinghua University 340 2.6%3 Zhejiang University 311 2.4%4 Shanghai Jiao Tong University 288 2.2%5 Fudan University 208 1.6%6 Zhongyuan University of Technology 167 1.3%7 Shanghai University 136 1.0%8 Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd 131 1.0%9 Nanjing University 128 1.0%
10 Tongji University 122 0.9%
Nanotechnology patenting in China and Germany – a comparison of patentlandscapes by bibliographic analyses
Table 2 Top 10 of patent applicants in Germany (1985-2007). Source: SciFinder Scholar™, November 2009.
Rank Applicant Number of patents Percentage of all patents1 BASF SE 146 5.0%
2 Bayer AG 141 4.9%
3 Infineon Technologies AG 118 4.1%
4 Henkel KGaA 73 2.5%
5 Siemens AG 70 2.4%
6 Degussa AG, Germany 62 2.1%
7 Robert Bosch GmbH, Germany 42 1.4%
8 VEB, DDR 36 1.2%
9 Hoechst AG, Germany 35 1.2%
10 Merck KGaA 29 1.0%
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technology.With regard to the Top 10 of patent applicants
in Germany, a completely different situation ari-ses (see table 2). Here, all Top 10 patent applicantsare private enterprises. Universities or researchinstitutes play a secondary role. Though, the shareof patents, related to the Top 10 patent applicants,is comparable, it also adds up to about 25%. Insummary, there can be identified a significantdifference between China and Germany regar-ding the key players in nanotechnology. Nano-patenting in China is dominated by research insti-tutes and universities, indicating that appliedresearch, similar to fundamental research, wit-
hin the field of nanotechnology is conducted bythese institutions. On the contrary, patenting andconsequently applied research within nanotech-nology in Germany is pursued by industry.
77..33 TTeecchhnnoollooggyy ffiieellddss
Despite major differences in the role of thevarious patent applicants, nanopatenting in Chinaand Germany focuses on similar technology fields(see table 3 and 4). For this analysis, we make useof the CA section titles provided within SciFinderScholar™. Each reference within SciFinder Scho-lar™ is assigned content based to one subject area
10Electrochemical, Radiational, & Thermal Energy Technolo-gy
409 3.2%
Table 3 Top 10 patent technology fields in China (analysis using CA section titles). Source: SciFinder Scholar™, November2009.
Table 4 Top 10 patent technology fields in Germany (analysis using CA section titles). Source: SciFinder Scholar™,November 2009.
Rank CA section title Number of patents Percentage of all patents1 Electric Phenomena 324 11.2%
2 Pharmaceuticals 231 8.0%
3 Coatings, Inks, & Related Products 220 7.6%
4 Ceramics 164 5.7%
5 Plastics Fabrication & Uses 164 5.7%
6 Plastics Manufacture & Processing 158 5.5%
7 Biochemical Methods 123 4.2%
8 Industrial Inorganic Chemicals 94 3.2%
9 Essential Oils & Cosmetics 88 3.0%
10Optical, Electron, Mass Spectroscopy & Other Related Pro-perties
86 3.0%
Nina Preschitschek and Dominic Bresser
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by the CAS (the responsible division of the Ame-rican Chemical Society for SciFinder Scholar™).In China, most patents refer to inventions withinthe field of pharmaceuticals or industrial inor-ganic chemicals. Electric phenomena are rankedat fourth place for China (5,9% of all patents arerelated to this field). Meanwhile this particulartechnological field covers the highest number ofpatents in Germany. Such as in China, a highamount of nanopatents comprises inventions inthe range of pharmaceuticals and also plastics.Comparing the Top 10 patent technology fields,interference for 7 of the Top 10 technology fieldscan be determined. On the whole, we can onlyidentify slight differences. However, the analy-sis of the section titles reveals the bridging andinterdisciplinary character of nanotechnology,already mentioned in the introduction of this arti-cle, since nanopatents refer to inventions fromdiverse technological fields, both in China and inGermany.
77..44 IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaalliittyy
Finally, we also analyze to what extent inter-nationality matters in the respective patentingstrategies of China and Germany. Whereas in Ger-many only about the half of all patents withinnanotechnology are solely applied for at theDPMA, an international patenting strategy is pur-sued for the other half, including EPO and PCT(Patent Cooperation Treaty) applications. In China,more than 98% of all patents are solely appliedfor at the SIPO. An increasing trend towards inter-national patenting in future cannot be identifiedso far, as the average number of patents appliedfor at the WIPO, USPTO or other patent offices stillremains very low. Reasons for this lack of inter-nationality in Chinese nanopatenting may ori-ginate from the dominant role of universities andresearch institutes in nanopatenting. Both maybe less interested in international patent protecti-on of their inventions, since they possibly do notgenerally focus on a worldwide commercializa-tion of their research results. Another argumentcould be that international patent applicationsare too cost-intensive, due to high costs for trans-lation as well as for international patent attor-neys.
8 Conclusions
In this article, we conduct a keyword search,based on the search term “nano”, to give an over-view on the patent landscapes of China and Ger-many within the emerging field of nanotechno-logy. For this purpose, we apply patent analyses
to assess historical trends in nanopatenting aswell as major patent applicants, research topicsand patenting strategies for China and Germa-ny respectively. This enables us to describe thecurrent status of patenting activities in nanotech-nology as well as major differences in regard tothe patenting strategies of both countries.
Our findings confirm the increasing impor-tance of China, becoming a major player withinthe field of nanotechnology. Both, the above-ave-rage growth rate and the highest absolute num-ber of nanopatents per year since 2005 indicatethat China will play a significant role in nano-technology applied research in the future. For thisreason, China is an important strategic and col-laborative partner for established countries likeGermany, not only in fundamental research, asthe high number of scientific publications in nano-technology indicates, but also in applied nano-technology research.
Furthermore, our analyses show that signifi-cant differences exist in regard to key players innanopatenting between China and Germany. Onthe one hand, the high importance of universi-ties and research institutes in nanopatenting inChina is a residue from the period of state-con-trolled research planning, when research andindustrial production were separated from eachother. As already mentioned earlier within thisarticle, research was solely undertaken by uni-versities and research institutes until the begin-ning of the 1990s. Thus, Chinese enterprises thenlacked competence in undertaking research andinnovation management and this fact continu-es to affect China’s current research activities.Nowadays, private enterprises in China benefitfrom their advantage in labor-intensive producti-on compared to other industrial countries. The-refore, they are still less interested in gainingcompetences in research and development (Lief-ner and Kroll, 2007). On the other hand, Chineseuniversities and research institutes gain enlar-ged freedom in research in the course of the reformof the national research system and thereforeintensify their engagement in applied research.Due to the decreasing governmental sponsorship,universities simultaneously set up science-parksand spin-offs to commercialize their research andconsequently to secure their research funding(Shapira and Wang, 2009). Both developmentsaccount for the dominating role of universitiesand research institutes in applied research inChina.
In contrast to Chinese universities, Germanuniversities mostly concentrate on fundamentaland little on applied research. As fundamentalresearch is generally excluded from any patent
Nanotechnology patenting in China and Germany – a comparison of patentlandscapes by bibliographic analyses
11
protection, German universities do not appear askey players in patenting. In addition, they standfor an open-science mentality and therefore focuson publishing their research results within scien-tific literature instead on their commercializati-on resulting in increased patenting activities (Bal-dini, 2009) Besides this, research in Germany isconsiderably funded by government, so that pri-vate funding is of less importance, at least in fun-damental research so far (Beise and Stahl, 1999;Vincent-Lancrin, 2006). For this reason, Germanuniversities are not forced to search for alterna-tive sources of income, as universities in Chinahave to.
Moreover, patenting strategies vary in thedegree of the broadness of patent protection. Chi-nese patent applicants only pursue national paten-ting, whereas German applicants focus to a con-siderable degree on international protection fortheir inventions. It is of high importance for allinvolved parties to be aware of and to considerthese differences before searching for and estab-lishing collaborations between both countries,since they may complicate successful collabora-tions.
In this regard, more detailed and revised ana-lyses of the respective patent landscapes shouldbe considered. In particular, other databases, e.g.special patent databases like Derwent WorldPatents Index, should be scanned to verify if thepresent datasets are substantially representati-ve for the patent landscapes of the respectiveresearch field and countries. Moreover, theemployment of a detailed search algorithm willlead to more entire datasets and therefore morespecific bibliometric analyses will be realizable,e.g. in regard to technological fields or citationsand co-authorships which can be used as indica-tors for already existing collaborations.
innovations in Germany, Research Policy, 2288 (4), pp. 397-422.
BMBF (2009): nano.DE-Report 2009 – Status Quo of nano-technology in Germany, Bonn.
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Debackere, K., Verbeek A., Luwel, M., & Zimmermann, E. (2002):Measuring progress and evolution in science and tech-nology – II: The multiple uses of technometric indica-tors, International Journal of Management Review, 44 (3),pp. 213-231.
Frietsch, R., & Wang, J. (2007): Intellectual property rightsand innovation activities in China: Evidence from patentsand publications, Fraunhofer Institute for Systems andInnovation Research, Karlsruhe.
Guan, J.C., Yam, R.C., & Mok, C.K. (2005): Collaboration bet-ween industry and research institutes/universities onindustrial innovation in Beijing, China, Technology Ana-lysis & Strategic Management, 1177 (3), pp. 339-353.
Huang, Z., Chen, H., Chen, Z., & Roco, M.C. (2004): Internatio-nal nanotechnology development in 2003: country, insti-tution, and technology field analysis based on USPTOpatent database, Journal of Nanoparticle Research, 66 (4),pp. 325-354.
Huang, Z., Chen, H., Li, X., & Roco, M.C. (2006): ConnectingNSF funding to patent innovation in nanotechnology(2001-2004), Journal of Nanoparticle Research, 88 (6), pp.859-879.
Kostoff, R.N., Murday, J.S., Lau, C.G.Y., & Tolles, W.M. (2007):The seminal literature of nanotechnology research, Jour-nal of Nanoparticle Research, 88 (2), pp. 193-213.
Kraßer, R. (2009): Patentrecht, 6. Auflage, C.H. Beck, Mün-chen.
Liefner, I., & Kroll, H. (2007): Universitäre Spin-off-Unterneh-men und universitär-industrieller Technologietransferin China, in: Hof, H., Wengenroth, U. (eds.), Innovations-forschung, LIT Verlag Dr. W. Hopf, Hamburg, pp. 227-241.
Li, X., Lin, Y., Chen, H., & Roco, M.C. (2007): Worldwide nano-technology development: a comparative study of USPTO,EPO, and JPO patents (1976-2004), Journal of Nanopar-ticle Research, 99 (6), pp. 977-1002.
Liu, X. & White, S. (2001): An exploration into regional varia-tion in innovation activity in PR China, International Jour-nal of Technology Management, 2211 (1/2), pp. 114-129.
Liu, X., Zhang, P., Li, X., Chen, H., Dang, Y., Larson, C., Roco, M.C.,& Wang, X. (2009): Trends for nanotechnology develop-ment in China, Russia, and India, Journal of Nanoparti-cle Research, 1111 (8), pp. 1854-1866.
Michelson, E.S. (2008): Globalization at the nano frontier:The future of nanotechnology policy in the United States,China, and India, Technology in Society, 3300 (3-4), pp. 405-410.
OECD (2007): Capturing nanotechnology’s current state of
Alencar, M.S.M., Porter, A.L., & Antunes, A.M.S. (2007): Nano-patenting patterns in relation to product life cycle, Tech-nological Forecasting and Social Change, 7744 (9), pp. 1661-1680.
Appelbaum, R.P., & Parker, R.A. (2008): China’s bid to beco-me a global nanotech leader: Advancing nanotechno-logy through state-led programs and international col-laborations, Science and Public Policy, 3355 (5), pp. 319-334.
Baldini, N. (2009): Implementing Bayh-Dole-like laws: Facul-ty problems and their impact on university patentingactivity, Research Policy, 3388 (8), pp. 1217-1224.
Beise, M., & Stahl, H. (1999): Public research and industrial
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development via analysis of patents, STI working Paper.OECD (2009): Nanotechnology: An overview based on indi-
cators and statistics, STI Working Paper.Porter, A.L., Youtie, J., Shapira, P., & Schoeneck, D.J. (2008): Refi-
ning search terms for nanotechnology, Journal of Nanop-article Research, 1100 (5), pp. 715-728.
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Steinmann, M. (1992): Grundzüge des chinesischen Patent-rechts, Carl Heymanns Verlag, Cologne.
Vincent-Lancrin, S. (2006): What is changing in academicresearch? Trends and future scenarios. European Jour-nal of Education, 4411 (2), pp. 169-202.
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Introduction
Nanotechnology is playing an increasinglyimportant role in the development of sensors.Biosensors represent anespecially excitingoppor-tunity for high-impact applications benefitingfrom “nano” attributes. A biosensor is a devicethat combines a biological recognition element
with a physical or chemical transducer to detecta biological analyte. In general, a biosensor con-sists of three components: the biological recogni-tion element, the transducer, and signal proces-sing electronics. Nanomaterials can contributein either thebio-recognition element or the trans-ducer, or both, of a biosensor. The effective bio-recognition area, i.e. the area actually interacting
Research SectionIdentifying the emerging roles of nanoparti-cles in biosensors
Lu Huang*, Zhengchun Peng**, Ying Guo*** andAlan L. Porter****
This paper profiles R&Don the applicationofnanoparticles in biosensors andexplo-res potential application development pathways. The analysis uses a dataset ofnanotechnology publication records for the time period 2001 through 2008 (partyear) extracted from the Science Citation Index. It focuses on emergent researchactivities in the most recent years. Bibliometric analyses are employed to ascer-tain R&D trends and research networks for key biosensors. Growthmodels are fitto forecast the technological trend for nanoparticle-enhanced biosensor researchactivity. In addition, a combination of quantity (publication) and quality (citati-on) analysis for nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors helps position the leading coun-tries in this research field. Science overlaymapping shows different emphases ofnanoparticle-enhanced biosensor research between theUS andChina, the leadingcountries. Recent studies suggest that nano-enhanced biosensors show promisefor gains in stability, sensitivity, selectivity, and accuracy - for both direct and indi-rect detection. This paper demonstrates how bibliometric analyses can help anti-cipate emerging technology development and application potential.
* School of Management and Economics, Beijing Institute of Technology, 5 South ZhongguancunStreet, Haidian District, Beijing, 100081, P.R.China;School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0345, USA,[email protected]
** School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0405, USAInstitute of Bioengineering and Bioscience, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332,USA , [email protected]
*** School of Management and Economics, Beijing Institute of Technology, 5 South ZhongguancunStreet, Haidian District, Beijing, 100081, P.R.ChinaSchool of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0345, USA,[email protected]
****Technology Policy and Assessment Center, School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology,Atlanta, GA 30332-0345, USA, Search Technology, Inc., [email protected]
Identifying the emerging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors
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with the analyte, is one of the important para-meters that determines the sensitivity of a bio-sensor. Nanomaterials, especially nanoparticles,provideapromisingway to increase thebio-recog-nition area (Khanna,2008),because thehigh sur-face to volume ratio of nanoparticles provides alargenumberof sites available formolecular inter-actions (Kim et al., 2004).
In recent years, a wide variety of nanoparti-cles with different properties have found broadapplication in biosensors. Because of their smallphysical size, nanoparticles present unique che-mical, physical, and electronic properties that aredifferent from those of bulkmaterials (Luo et al.,2006), and improved and new biosensors aredesigned benefiting from these novel attributes.Functional nanoparticles bound to biologicalmolecules (e.g. peptides, proteins, nucleic acids)havebeendeveloped foruse inbiosensors todetectand amplify various (e.g. electronic, optical, andmagnetic) signals (Chen, 2004). Most recent stu-dies show that biosensors composedwithnanop-articles do take on rapid, sensitive, accurate, andstablemeasurements,which offers excitingnewopportunities for the development of biosensingcapabilities. Nowadays, nanoparticle-enhancedbiosensors show significant development.Researchers tend to integrate nanoparticles intothematerials used for biosensor construction inorder to improve the performance of the systemin both existing and potential sensing applicati-ons.
Analyzing R&Ddevelopment trends and rela-tionships for nano-enhancedbiosensors canhelpbusiness decision-makers take best advantage ofemerging opportunities (Porter et al., 1991). Alt-hough nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors havebeen researched and affirmed to provide remar-kable functional improvements, fewstudies havetried to systematically characterize the roles ofnanoparticles in enhancing biosensor functiona-lity (Shipway,2008). Our researchquestionsaboutnano-enhanced biosensors R&D are:
What are the R&D trends?Which countries lead the nano-enhanced bio-sensors R&D?Which fields are engaged in this research?What are the emerging roles of nanoparticlesin biosensors?Which nanoparticles offer the greatest poten-tial for commercial applications?
Approach and data
We employ bibliometric analyses to ascertainR&D trends and research networks for nanopar-
ticle-enhanced biosensors. Bibliometric analysisis a set of tools for extracting information fromlarge databases looking for patterns and explai-ned reasons for apparently unstructured beha-vior (Daim,2005). Bibliometric analysis can playimportant roles in pursuing chemical businessopportunities fromthree aspects.The first is tech-nology forecasting. After getting historical datafromauthoritativedatabases,we canadjust thesebibliometric data using an S-curve as away to fitthe technological growth process (Daim, 2006),analyzing research trends and identifying emer-ging areas of technology. Secondly, bibliometricmethods can help determine the technology lifecycle position and gauge itsmaturity level.Mar-tino (2003) presents bibliometric analysis divi-ding the data in five categories. As he described,when the technological development is at thebasic research stage, the Science Citation Index(SCI) nicely represents that literature. When thetechnological development reaches the appliedresearch stage, the technological literature iswellrepresented by the Engineering Index (EI) litera-ture (for certain technologies). When develop-ment reaches the experimental developmentphase, patent documentation is a good reflecti-on. When the development reaches the applica-tion stage, Newspaper Abstracts depict activitypatterns. At last, bibliometrics can investigateinformation through the use of different indica-tors such as publications, cited references, occur-rences of words, phrases, citations, co-citations,authorship and related characteristics that mayextract hiddenpatterns fromstructureddata,pre-senting the whole picture of research networksand relationships (Watts et al., 2001).The datasets used in these bibliometric studiescome from global nanotechnology publicationsfor the timeperiod 2001 through 2008 (part year)extracted from different databases: SCI, Inspec,Compendex, and Factiva. This paper focuses onSCI data for intensive study to capture the emer-gent research activities, especially those promi-nent in the most recent 4 years. The SCI datasetof publicationsdrawsupon thedefinitionofnano-technology and thedata-cleaningmethods deve-loped by a Georgia Tech group. Our basic nanosearch locates abstract records containing“nano*”or anyof 7modular termsets,as discussedbyPor-ter et al. (2008). Within the resulting dataset (ofsome 500,000 publication abstracts), we thensearch for those specifically discussing “biosen-sors,” and “nanoparticles”. Besides these basicsearch terms, we add other terms like specificcategories of biosensor (such as glucose, choles-terol, enzyme, DNA, genome, hydrogen-peroxi-de, alcohol,nitrate,amino acid,protein chip,DNA
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo, Alan L. Porter
array, immunoassay, sandwich assay, competiti-ve assay,etc.) and variants of nanoparticles (suchasAg,Au,Pt,Cds,Pbs,ZnO,SiO2,polystyrene,quan-tum dots, metal, semiconductor, polymer, etc.).Using this approach, 1,400 publication recordswere drawn from SCI to create a dataset for the2001-2008 (mid-year) time period. At the sametime, we also set up two other datasets drawnfrom the Inspec & Compendex databases with1,715 records, and from Factiva with 489 records.However, the searchmethod for these later data-sets is much simpler than that used for the SCIdataset, just using basic search terms of“biosen-sor” and “nanoparticles”.
Results
TTrreenndd aannaallyysseess
We begin by showing a trend line based onthe cumulative number of publications by eachof the three datasets (Figure 1). We are trying tofind out the development status of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors. The sharp upward trend inarticles relating nanoparticles to biosensors showstheir increasingly important role. Examining thesethree growth curves, we find that 2004 is the key
point for both the SCI and Inspec & Compendexdata series. At about that time, the basic researchand the more applied research on nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors accelerated into a steeperrate of growth. In comparison, the publicationcounts of Factiva, reflecting broader business andgeneral public attention, started to increase moresteeply in 2007. This suggests that the popularbusiness application of nanoparticles in biosen-sors lags basic and applied research by aboutthree years.
What is likely to happen in the near future?The last data point for the INSP/Compendex seriesis estimated because our data reflect only abouthalf of the expected complete 2008 tally. Thatsaid, we still note that this point indicates a pos-sible slight decline in applied research on thetopic. On the other hand, the increasing rate ofpublications for SCI in the most recent two yearssuggests that a further expansion of applied R&Dcould be anticipated. So, those interested in tra-cking this emerging technology would want tomonitor developments quite closely in the comingyears to ascertain the development pattern.
In order to gain a richer perspective on thetechnology life cycle position and maturity levelfor nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors, we extra-
Figure 1 Cumulative publications of nanoparticles applications in biosensor by database1
1) Databases used: Science Citation Index, INSPEC&COMPENDEX, and Factiva, 2001-2008 (estimated). In order to get more accurate result for the comparison analysis for thesethree datasets, search terms for SCI in this chart are the same with the other two datasets with “nano*”,“biosensor” and “nanoparticle”.
Identifying the emerging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors
17
polate the R&D trends.2Figure 2 gives one result
of trend analyses of publications indexed by SCIthrough the year 2012. Bibliometric data can bemodeled using an S-curve as a way to fit the tech-nological growth process. Here, we choose a Gom-pertz Model to fit the data with a high R2 coeffi-cient of 0.99. It suggests that steep growth couldcontinue over the next few years. Similarly, trendanalyses for the INSPEC & Compendex datasetsalso follows an increasing trend over the next 4years (not shown here). According to the resultsof our trend extrapolation, we estimate that thereis still a long time, likely several years or longer,for basic and applied research on nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors to grow.
The evidence is strong that nanotechnologyhas recently become one of the most excitingforefront elements in biosensor R&D. In order toidentify the position of nanoparticle-enhancedbiosensors among all the nanomaterial-enhan-ced biosensors, this paper partitions the biblio-metric data. We separate the publication countsof nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors from thoseof any nanomaterial-enhanced biosensors. Wethen establish a ratio between these. The publi-cations of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors areprimarily from the results of searching the terms,“nanoparticle” and “biosensors”. The publicati-ons of nanomaterial-enhanced biosensors comefrom the results of searching the term “nano*”with “biosensors”. Based on these bibliometricdata, we again seek to examine the trend and to
forecast the technological growth process ofnanoparticle-enhanced biosensors using suitab-le growth models. In Figure 3, a linear model isused to fit the ratio data from SCI for 2001 to 2008and gives another trend trajectory extended tothe year of 2012. Similarly, a linear model fits thedata from INSPEC/COMPENDEX quite well (notshown here). According to the results, we esti-mate that nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors havemore potential than other nanomaterial-enhan-ced biosensors in the next few years, because thevalue in the year 2012 is still smaller than the limitof “1.” However, to some extent we were concer-ned by the goodness of fit of the two trend ana-lyses, because the coefficients of determinationof these two models are not very high (0.78 and0.79, respectively).
Those coefficients just affirm the visual appea-rance – the fit of the line is not so strong in theearlier years; however, it is quite close in morerecent years.
As an emerging field, there has been muchinterest in the leading countries in research onnanoparticle-enhanced biosensors. This papernot only compares the numbers of publications,but also focuses on the quality and influence ofcountries in this research field. Citations, as mea-sured by the number of times a paper has been
Figure 1 Cumulative publications of nanoparticles applications in biosensor by database3
2) We show this only for the SCI data; in the text we mention the other R&D trends based on INSPEC/Compendex. The Factiva data don’t pertain to R&D, so we don’t analyzethem in this way to model the technology maturation.
3) The limit of Gompertz Model here is equal to 1,200, and Coeff Det. is equal to 0.99, which is higher than other models, such as Fisher-Pry Model and Exponential Model.
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo, Alan L. Porter
18
cited, are used here to gauge the level of quality,or impact, of the publications of a country. [Thisis an imperfect measure, of course, but it is wide-ly accepted as a reasonable indicator that otherresearchers find worthwhile research knowled-ge therein (Van, 1988).] The particular analyticalmethod used in this paper focuses on the coun-try location of the affiliation of the first authorof the publication. The first author’s country isused to assign citation numbers to that country.This focus on the first author is designed to pre-clude duplicating citation counts.
Another method to be pointed out is that weemploy a simple aging practice based on dividingthe citations in a given year by the number ofyears of opportunity to be cited. This is becausecitations are difficult to evaluate over time. Ear-lier papers have more occasions to receive citati-ons than do more recent papers (Youtie et al.,2008). As for our dataset of SCI, the most recentyear is the mid-year of 2008; thus in 2001, papershave 6.5 years of opportunity to attract citationsrelative to the end-point of our dataset. So thenumber of citations to papers published in thatyear is divided by 6.5. Similarly, in 2002, the num-ber of citations should be divided by 5.5; the num-ber 2006 citations is divided by 1.5; and so forth.So, “aged citations” gives us a metric to help gaugechange in nations’ research publications impact
over time. Again, this is not a precision measu-re, but it provides for viable comparison.
In order to make results more robust, we com-bine the tallies for two-year periods. To reflectthe earlier time period, we add 2001 and 2002together, and compare with the correspondingnumber for 2005 and 2006 combined. We use2005-06 to allow a few years for papers to accruecitations. Figure 4 shows the results. A trend lineconnects the results for (2001 + 2002) to those for(2005 + 2006). We first consider location alongthe X axis, which reflects publication counts, andfind that, in the early time period, the USA is theleader, although the publication counts are modestwith 14. However, by the later period, China hastaken over the lead in publishing on nanoparti-cles in biosensors with 158. The Y axis of Figure 4shows the citations received by those papers,adjusted by the years available since publicationin which to be cited. Looking at the starting andthe ending points of the lines, we find the US washighest in 2001-02 citation intensity and itremains the leader in the 2005-06 period.
The steeper the slope of the line connectingthese two points, the greater the quality orienta-tion of the country has been increasing. FromFigure 4, we can find that the US has the steepestslope, suggesting that its nanoparticle-enhancedresearch receives the greatest attention by
Figure 3 Linear model adjust to ratio of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensor SCI data4
2013
.4
.3
.2
.5
.6
.7
.8
.9
.
4) The value of the points in the chart represents the ratio of publication counts of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors divided by publications counts of any nanomaterial-enhan-ced biosensors. The search terms of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors are “biosensors” and “nanoparticle’; While search terms of nanomaterial-enhanced biosensors are “bio-sensors” and “nano*”.
Identifying the emerging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors
19
researchers. As noted, China is also a leading coun-try in research publication; here we see that Chi-nese publications also receive increasing citati-ons. Israel, Italy, and Japan have far fewer publi-cations and citations than does China (see theinsert of Figure 4). However, the steep slope oftheir lines relative to China suggests that theirpapers have relatively higher impact. Germany,Spain, and South Korea are also important play-ers in the research on nanoparticle-enhanced bio-sensors. So any competitive technical intelligence(“CTI”) endeavors would also want to monitortheir research initiatives.
“Nano” research is highly multidisciplinary(National Science and Technology Council, 1999;Eto, 2003; Loveridge et al., 2008; Roco, 2008; Por-ter and Youtie, under submission). That said, there
is considerable discourse as to which fields areimportantly involved and the extent to whichresearch knowledge is actively shared amongthem (Roco and Bainbridge, 2003; Meyer, 2006).We have found that visualizations of the researchfields involved help one gain perspective on theactivity.
We also examine the citations from a diffe-rent point of view. Most highly cited authors (top50) in our SCI dataset from 2001 through 2008are mapped via the help of VantagePoint soft-ware [see www.theVantagePoint.com] in Figure5. The size of the node reflects the number of cita-tions, and the strength of the links shown repre-sents the degree of association based on co-cita-tion (the extent to which papers reference bothof a pair of authors). It should be noticed that nolink between two nodes doesn’t mean zero co-citations, just fewer co-citations6. Proximity inthese Multi-Dimensional Scaling (MDS) mapsalso suggests relationship, but not as definitely
Figure 4 Number of aged citations of nanoparticles applications in biosensor in 2001 plus 2002 and 2005 plus 2006 relativto number of articles of nanoparticles applications in biosensor by first author.5
USA
China
Japan
Israel
Germany
Italy
South Korea
Spain
4020 60 80 1000 120 130 140 1500
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
Num
ber of Aged* Citations
Number of Articles Year donated by start and end points2001+20022005+2006
5) *Aged citations(AC) for countryi calculated as ACi=Cti/(Yn-Yt) where Cti=total number of citations for articles in target year for countryi; Yn=most recent year in dataset (2008,mid-year); and Yt=target year. For 2001, Yn-Yt=6.5; for 2002, Yn-Yt=5.5; for 2005, Yn-Yt=2.5; for 2006, Yn-Yt=1.5. Country designated by article first author. Database used: ScienceCitation Index.
6)The threshold of the MDS is set to 0.25 here. So, absence of a connecting link means that few (not necessarily zero) papers cite both researchers. The nature of this “co-citation”sampling means that not all prominent researchers will likely be located.
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo, Alan L. Porter
Identifying the emerging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors
21
as do the path-erasing based links (lines). Loca-tion along the axes has no inherent meaning.
The clustering seen in Figure 5 suggests pos-sible concentrations in the cited literature. Weexamined in which journals the different highlyco-cited authors published most heavily. We thenassociate those journals with their SCI subjectcategories, noting four particularly prominentones:
CChheemmiissttrryy,, AAnnaallyyttiiccaall:: with Wang J (ArizonaState Univ) as the centrally-cited authorMMaatteerriiaallss SScciieennccee,, MMuullttiiddiisscciipplliinnaarryy:: a group atNorthwestern University, including Mirkin CA,Yonzon CR, Malinsky MD , and Haes AJEElleeccttrroocchheemmiissttrryy:: Bard AJ (University of Texas,Austin); Liu SQ (Nanjing University); Rusling JF(University of Connecticut); Lvov Y (LouisianaTech Univ)BBiiootteecchhnnoollooggyy:: Willner I and Xiao Y (The Heb-rew Univ of Jerusalem); Liu GD (Pacific North-west National Lab); Mirkin CA (NorthwesternUniversity); Nie SM and Bao G (Georgia Insti-tute of Technology).
Science mapping is emerging as a specialtyin its own right (Chen, 2003; Boyack et al., 2005).We have been developing a “science overlay map-ping” approach to locate particular research setson a base science map (Leydesdorff and Rafols,forthcoming; Rafols and Meyer, forthcoming).This approach uses the Subject Categories thatWeb of Science assigns to journals. For a set ofpublications indexed by Web of Science (in thiscase, by SCI, which is part of Web of Science), welocate that research by the journals in which itappears. Figures 6 and 7 do that for subsets ofthe “nanoparticles and biosensors” researchpapers, which are based on SCI dataset for 2005through part-year 2008 in order to focus on theemergent characters of recent 4 years. The basemap reflects the 175 Subject Categories shown bythe background intersecting arcs among them.The Subject Categories are then grouped into“macro-disciplines” using a form of factor analy-sis (Principal Components Analysis) based on thedegree of co-citation of the Subject Categories ina large sample of articles indexed by Web of Sci-ence (Porter and Rafols, forthcoming). Thosemacro-disciplines become the labels in the figu-re. The “nanoparticles in biosensors” researchconcentrations appear as nodes on this map.
These science overlay maps particularly helpus answer two questions: which research fieldsare engaged? And how similar is the approach ofdifferent players? In this case, we choose to focuson national comparisons. We only show two of
the leading countries active in this research arena– the US and China. Some observations include:
Nanoparticles in Biosensors research involvesa very extensive range of research fieldsThat research is centered in Materials Sciencesand ChemistryThe research also involves a number of Biome-dical Sciences
The Chinese and American research patternsare largely similar – both engage the same broadswath of research fields. But Chinese and Ameri-can research emphases are not identical (Table 1shows significant variations, particularly in che-mical specialties).
Table 1 tabulates the leading Subject Catego-ries represented by Chinese and American publi-cations in this area for 2005-08. On the left, onesees the number of publications associated witheach Subject Category. At the top is the numberof publications by China and by the USA. The per-centages are taken of the national totals. So, forexample, 57% of China’s articles indexed by SCIfor this search set (nanoparticles and biosensors)are associated with Analytical Chemistry jour-nals and another 40% are linked to Electroche-mistry [We note that the column percentagestotal over 100%; that is because Web of Scienceassociates some journals (~39%) with more thanone Subject Category.]. So, the Chinese research,in comparison to the American, emphasizes Che-mistry more heavily. Conversely, notice that Ame-rican articles are considerably more apt to entailPhysics sub-areas than are the Chinese. Discer-ning such differences (and pursuing their impli-cations) can be vital to proactive business manage-ment.
Reviewing recent studies, we find that manykinds of nanoparticles have been widely used inbiosensors. Here, we group nanoparticles intofour families - metal nanoparticles, semiconductornanoparticles, magnetic nanoparticles, and allother types (including polymer nanoparticles,silica nanoparticles, and so on). All these nanop-articles can be used in biosensors, as long as theparticle surface is modified with specific functio-nal groups. Since different families of nanopar-ticles, and sometimes nanoparticles of the samefamily, can play different roles in biosensor sys-tems, we attempt to identify the most represen-tative properties taken on by different nanopar-ticles, either in a group or individually. In Figure
Figure 7 Locating China “Nanoparticles in Biosensors” research over a base map of science
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo, Alan L. Porter
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8, we summarize the detailed ties from the mostfrequently researched nanoparticles to their uni-que properties, and to their possible enhance-ment of biosensing. Figure 8 reveals the extre-mely promising prospects of specific nanoparti-cles in designing new and improved biosensorsby using their unique chemical and physical pro-perties.
Our search results show that biosensors com-posed with nanoparticles do purport to provideadvantages in their sensitivity, stability, accura-cy, selectivity, and so on. For instance, improvedaccuracy and stability of biosensors were demons-trated by using nanoparticles as the solid sup-port and carrier of biological components, suchas proteins and DNA (Lynch et al., 2007). Thisimprovement benefits from the small physicalsize of nanoparticles, which minimizes the con-formational and activity change of the biologi-cal components. In addition, biosensors withimproved detection limits and selectivity havebeen developed by making use of the exceptio-nal catalytic effect of Pt and Au nanoparticles(Luo et al., 2006). Furthermore, biosensors capa-ble of highly sensitive and stable detection ofmultiple cancer markers were enabled by the high
fluorescent quantum yield and enhanced photo-stability of semiconductor nanoparticles such asCdS and CdSe quantum dots (Medintz et al., 2005).We mention that many polymer nanoparticles(e.g. polystyrene) offer not only direct bioconju-gation processes, but also promising biocompa-tibility. Therefore, we expect the polymer fami-ly of nanoparticles to play increasing roles in bio-sensing applications.
An important trend in current research is usingcomposite nanoparticles with combined proper-ties of polymer, semiconductor, and metal nanop-articles for multifunctional applications. Com-posite nanoparticles are mainly in the form ofcore-shell structures. Heavily researched onesinclude silver-polystyrene particles (Wu et al.,2003) and magnetite-dextran particles (Pank-hurst et al., 2003).
In terms of percentage of the aforementionedfour kinds (metal, semiconductor, magnetic, poly-mer) of nanoparticles, metal nanoparticles domi-nate (Figure 9). Before 2002, only metal and mag-netic nanoparticles were investigated for biosen-sor enhancement. Although semiconductor andpolymer nanoparticles were employed to enhan-ce the functions of biosensor systems later, these
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo, Alan L. Porter
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three kinds of nanoparticles are still relativelyminor components of this research domain. Toprobe a level deeper, we identified that metalnanoparticles constitute a big family, includingPt, Ag, Au, Pd, Cu nanoparticles and so on. Thiscould be a major reason for its high profile innanoparticle-enhanced biosensors. Turning tothe publications counts of typical metal nanop-articles applied in biosensors (Figure 10), we con-clude that gold (Au) nanoparticles are the mostfrequently used. The gold nanoparticles publica-tions count has kept increasing from 2001 to 2008.However, the other two metal nanoparticles, pla-tinum and silver, are only becoming popular inrecent years. Noticeably, platinum nanoparticlesappear to be an emerging nanoparticle which isincreasingly popular since 2007 in constructingbiosensors. Due to high surface free energy, goldnanoparticles can adsorb biomolecules stronglyand play an important role in the immobilizati-on of biomolecules for biosensor construction (Caiet al., 2001). In addition, the combination of thecatalytic properties of gold nanoparticles withthe specificity of biomolecular interactions canresult in the construction of highly sensitive andselective sensor systems (Xian et al., 2005). Fur-thermore, gold nanoparticles have been shownintegrated with carbon nanotubes to form nano-
hybrids to modify biosensors with improved indi-rect detection of enzymes (Cui et al., 2008).
As for the prominent research fields of nanop-article-enhanced biosensors, we selected five kindsof biosensors based on the biological componentsused for bio-recognition in the sensing scheme.In order to capture the character of this research,we focus on their publications numbers in ourSCI dataset during most recent 4 years (2005through 2008 part year). Figure 11 shows that thepublications counts of these 5 nanoparticle-enhan-ced biosensors are increasing over the years. Enzy-me-based biosensors are at the top followed byimmunosensors, chemical substance-based bio-sensors, genome sensors, and organism and cell-based biosensors.
We present these data to suggest to techno-logy analysts and managers the potential to gene-rate valuable CTI. Again, we reiterate that enga-gement of technical experts is essential to iden-tify the nuances and implications of such empi-rical information.
Discussion
This paper has examined R&D on nanoparti-cle-enhanced biosensors and employed biblio-metric analyses as a means to help forecast R&D
Figure 10 Cumulative publications of 3 typical metal nanoparticles applied inbiosensors. Databases used: Science Citation Index, 2001-2008 (estimated).
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
Identifying the emerging roles of nanoparticles in biosensors
27
trends and identify the emerging nanoparticleroles in biosensors. According to the results ofthe trend growth models, the R&D activities appe-ar likely to increase over the next few years.Moreover, nanoparticles show greater potentialto improve the performance of biosensors thando other nanomaterials.
In addition, a combination of quantity (publi-cation) and quality (citation) analysis for nanop-article-enhanced biosensors helps position theleading countries in this research field. Scienceoverlay mapping helps us see the different empha-ses of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors researchbetween the US and China. We noted the poten-tial complementarity in Chinese chemistry andUS physics emphases in this R&D. R&D mana-gers might well want to extend such analyses toprofile the research emphases of particular organi-zations. By identifying particular specializationsand research strengths, they can identify poten-tial technology development partners. Suchresearch outreach is becoming increasingly essen-tial as “Open Innovation” becomes increasinglyimportant (Chesbrough, 2006; Huston and Sak-
kab, 2006). This is especially so in today’s diffi-cult economy.
Nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors present ahighly cross-disciplinary research arena. This sug-gests value in exploring the relationships furt-her. Is research concentrated in particular Sub-ject Categories being fully utilized by researchersin other domains? What is the cooperativeresearch network? For instance, are there confe-rences to bring together the biomedicalresearchers with the chemists, the materials scien-tists, and the physicists, to share cutting edgeknowledge that could come to bear on nano-enhancement of various biosensors? For the tech-nology manager, what can you do to facilitatecross-field and cross-institutional researchknowledge transfer? Our perspective, based onthese bibliometric analyses, is that this field isripe for stimulated research knowledge exchange.The variety of nanoparticles, multiple functions,and diverse applications suggest that R&D mana-gers should actively reach out and exploit cross-area results.
Figure 11 Cumulative publications of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors in recent 4 years Databases used: Science Citation Index, 2005-2008 part year
2005 2006 2007 2008
Year
Num
ber o
f Pub
lications
0
20
40
60
80
100
Num
ber o
f pub
lications
120
Immunosensor
Genome sensor
Cell-based biosensor
Enzyme-based sensor
Chemical substance-based biosensor
Lu Huang, Zhengchun Peng, Ying Guo, Alan L. Porter
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biosensors to improve the performance of exis-ting and potential sensing applications. We ana-lyzed the increasing focus on specific functionsof nanoparticles and their ties to promising enhan-cement in biosensors. These specific functionsinclude catalytic, plasma-optical, quantum, elect-ro/chemiluminescent, and superparamagneticeffects. One type of nanoparticle can play diffe-rent roles in different biosensor systems, and itcan also play more than one role in the same bio-sensor system. Different types of nanoparticle-enhanced biosensors analyzed include enzyme-based biosensors, immunosensors, chemical sub-stance-based biosensors, genome sensors, andcell-based biosensors. We identified gold nanop-articles as especially promising for biosensorenhancement and probed their applications invarious biosensors using specific or combinedfunctions they possess. A future course of inves-tigation would involve developing enhancedmethods for discerning special functions of dif-ferent types of nanoparticles in biosensor sys-tems. Our observation that “nano in biosensors”research has become increasingly specific – interms of particular materials and particularfunctional gains – is a key indicator that this tech-nology is “emerging” (Watts and Porter, 1997).When research shifts from the general to the spe-cific, this is a key benchmark of maturation.
In closing, we note an important caution.Before basing business decisions on such researchprofiling and forecasting, one would want toobtain expert opinions by researchers and busi-ness people conversant with the topic (Two seniorresearchers and several others have reviewed andenhanced our analyses). Experts can help buildupon these results to suggest additional linkagesto related research domains to explore. Expertscan also help refine the searches and refocus theinquiry to better understand patterns in specificaspects of this emerging technology.
Acknowledgements
This research was undertaken at Georgia Tech,supported by the National Science Foundation(Award Nos. 0531194 and 0830207); Beijing Insti-tute of Technology, supported by the NationalScience Foundation of China (Award No.70639001). Many of the findings in this paperwere presented in the 18th International Confe-rence on Management of Technology (IAMOT).The authors also appreciate the valuable sugges-tions from Prof. Lawrence Bottomley in Chemis-try and Prof. Prof. Oliver Brand in Electrical Engi-neering (both at Georgia Tech).
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1 Introduction
Nowadays, researchers are facing highlycomplex problems, rapidly changing techno-logies and a dynamic growth of knowledge,due to the expansion of science on several axes,e.g. geographical, economical, multidiscipli-nary and multinational axis (Galison andHevly, 1992). Often, individual academic scien-tists can no longer provide all of the experti-se and resources necessary to address large
research projects (Hara et al., 2003). Further-more, these characteristics of modern researchencourage scientists to get involved in colla-borative research (Sooho and Bozeman, 2005).Generally, research collaborations1 can emer-ge between companies (C-C), companies anduniversities/research institutes (C-U) or uni-versities (U-U).2In particular, increasing global competiti-
on disposes companies to take advantage ofsynergy effects by intensifying global colla-
Research SectionKnowledge sharing in heterogeneous collabo-rations – a longitudinal investigation of across-cultural research collaboration in nanos-cience
Steffen Kanzler*
In times of globalization and rapidly developing R&D systems, the importance ofinternational collaborative research activities increases, leading to a growingnum-ber of heterogeneous collaborations. Especially considering the cultural diversityof such collaborations, intensive cross-cultural knowledge sharing becomes a pre-requisite for collaborative success. This paper investigates personal and culturalincentives and barriers influencing the intention to share knowledge of Chineseand German collaborators in an academic setting, employing a linear regressionanalysis and Chow tests.We can demonstrate that the factors sense of self-worth,loss of knowledge power, guanxi and face saving have an influence on an indivi-dual’s intention to share knowledge. Furtherwe find significant differences in ourChinese andGerman subgroups that can be related to cultural impacts. The obtai-ned results provide practical and theoretical implications for the improvement ofcross-cultural knowledge sharing in collaborative R&D project.
Knowledge sharing in heterogeneous collaborations – a longitudinal investigati-on of a cross-cultural research collaboration in nanoscience
1) Misleadingly, the terms ‘cooperation’ and ‘collaboration’ are often used synonymously. Further similar terms for example are: ‘alliance’, ‘confederacy’, ‘joint-venture’, ‘coalition’, or‘partnership’ (Müller, 2006). Cooperation is characterised by“an interaction process in which the individuals share a common goal and interact in a coordinated way”. Coordina-tion means some kind of superordinated entity that exerts influence on the proceedings of each group member with regard to the common goal (Gronau, 2002). On the con-trary, collaboration does not need such a coordination function. Collaboration just “means that people work together to achieve a single common result in which contributionsof individuals are unified” (Han, 1997).
2) In this paper we subsume research institutes and universities.
31
boration (Lam, 1997). Thereby, growth, expan-sion, exchange and generation of knowledgeand technology represent the main reasonsfor joint C-C research activities (Campione,2003; Odenthal et al., 2002).The intentions of collaborators to strive for
C-U collaboration differ. In addition to capita-lizing on cost savings and access to the latesttechnology, companies utilize this kind of col-laboration to open up cost-effective recruitingchannels, to access laboratory usage, to sharerisks for basic research and to stabilize longterm research projects (Azarloff, 1982; Bonac-corsi and Piccaluga, 1994; Cyert and Goodman,1997; Rohrbeck and Arnold, 2006). In contrast,universities engaging in C-U collaborationsstrive for the enhancement of teaching, follo-wed by achievement of funding and enhan-cement of reputation. Further motivations sup-porting collaborative behavior are to be foundin the possibility of exchanging knowledgewith industrial researchers, access to empiri-cal data and job opportunities for graduates(Hurmelinna, 2004; Meyer-Krahmer andSchmoch, 1998).However, in all types of collaborations and
especially in academic ones knowledge sha-ring represents a main incentive e.g. by meansof getting access to external knowledge on theone hand. On the other hand knowledge sha-ring is a prerequisite for successful collabora-tion (Hara et al., 2003; Niedergassel and Leker,2008; Qian et al., 2008). Knowledge sharinghas been in the focus of research for more thana decade and can be defined as the deploy-ment of knowledge from a source to a reci-pient in communication (Berends et al., 2006).Following Nonaka, we define knowledge asjustified true belief (Nonaka, 1994). Sinceknowledge is subjective and related to an indi-vidual’s experiences, knowledge sharing isembedded in a certain cognitive and behavio-ral context (Michailova and Hutchings, 2006).Qian et al. identified personal and culturalfactors that impact on knowledge sharing(Qian et al., 2008). Niedergassel developed aconceptual framework with influencing factorsfor knowledge sharing in collaborative R&Dprojects (Niedergassel, 2009). He hypothesi-zes an influence of knowledge tacitness,knowledge newness, physical proximity, fre-quency of personal communication, trust bet-ween partners, pre-existing relationships,interdependency of partners, redundancy of
knowledge sets and closeness of partners onknowledge sharing (Niedergassel, 2009).While knowledge sharing in C-C collabora-
tions has been widely discussed in the exis-ting body of literature (Abrams, 2003; Cantnerand Meder, 2007; Hansen, 1999; Hansen, 2002;Kaser and Miles, 2002; Lam, 1997; Levin andCross, 2004; Reagans and McEvily, 2003), lesseffort has been made in analyzing knowled-ge sharing in academic collaborations (Haraet al., 2003; Niedergassel, 2009). In times ofglobalization and rapidly developing R&D sys-tems, academic researchers increasingly stri-ve for geographically distributed collaborati-ons (Galison and Hevly, 1992; Hara et al., 2003).This leads to a constantly growing number ofheterogeneous collaboration.3 Generally, hete-rogeneous collaborations are characterized byan inequality of the collaborating partners.Heterogeneity can occur on several dimensi-ons. First, depending on contract situationsbetween collaborators, unequally distributedhierarchy can cause heterogeneity. Second,heterogeneity can arise in research discipli-nes, e.g. when researchers from different scien-tific backgrounds are working on interdisci-plinary projects. Third, the geographic distri-bution of the partners’ research basis can causeheterogeneity. Fourth, company and/or natio-nal culture can differ between collaboratingpartners, leading to heterogeneity.In sight of the discussed increase in geo-
graphically distributed collaborative partner-ships, especially cultural heterogeneity cancause serious difficulties in collaborativeknowledge sharing activities. Thus, the under-standing of cultural influences on knowledgesharing behavior is gaining importance. Still,only few studies analyzed cross-culturalknowledge sharing and they exclusively focu-sed on C-C collaborations. Chow et al., forinstance, analyzed the impact of collectivismversus individualism on the knowledge sha-ring behavior of Chinese and U.S. Americanindividuals (Chow et al., 2000). Similarly,Michailova and Hutchings compared knowled-ge sharing in Russia and China focusing oncollectivism/individualism and universa-lism/particularism (Michailova and Hutchings,2006). Zhang et al. on the other hand investi-gated the impact of in-group/out-group affi-liation on knowledge sharing in a cross-cul-tural setting (Zhang et al., 2008), which Chowindicated as well (Chow et al., 2000). Referring
3) Heinze and Kuhlmann define heterogeneous research collaboration as collaboration across institutional boundaries (Heinze and Kuhlmann, 2006). However, we expand thescope beyond the organizational dimension.
32
to Chow, Michailova and Hutchings, Ardich-vili emphasized the importance of the cultu-ral factors collectivism/individualism, in-group/out-group orientation, fear of losingface, and the importance of status and powerdistance, in his research on culture-specificbarriers to knowledge sharing in China, Rus-sia and Brazil (Ardichvili et al., 2006).Contributing by filling the research gap
regarding cross-cultural knowledge sharingin academic settings, we investigate differentintentions to share knowledge in the first Chi-nese-German research collaboration on Nanos-cience. Particularly, we focus on personal andcultural factors impacting the collaborators’intention to share knowledge, employing alongitudinal research approach.In the course of this paper, we first descri-
be our research framework. Second, we pre-sent cultural factors differing between Chine-se and German societies. Third, the SocialExchange Theory will be discussed and usedto explain knowledge sharing behavior. After-wards, we will present our hypotheses con-cerning the factors potentially impacting theintention to share knowledge. Subsequently,we will characterize our methodology, follo-wed by a presentation of the results. Finally,a discussion and conclusion will summarizethe findings of this paper, providing recom-mendations and practical guidelines for impro-ving the process of knowledge sharing.
2 The Transregional CollaborativeResearch Centre: a heterogeneouscollaboration
The “Transregional Collaborative ResearchCentre” (TRR 61) represents the first academicChinese-German research collaboration onNanoscience and is entitled “Multilevel Mole-cular Assemblies: Structure, Dynamics andFunction”. Participants within the TRR 61 arethe University of Münster (Germany), the Cen-
tre for Nanotechnology (CeNTech), the Centrefor Nonlinear Science (CeNoS), the TsinghuaUniversity (Beijing, China), the Chinese Aca-demy of Science, the Interdisciplinary ResearchCentre for Cooperative Functional Systems(FOKUS) and the Chinese National Centre forNanoScience & Technology (NCNST, Bei-jing/China). Inspired by natural systems andtheir properties, chemists, physicists and bio-logists are working on the interdisciplinaryfield of functional molecular and nano objectassemblies. Participants of the TRR 61 are hie-rarchically equal and their knowledge is acces-sible for everybody within the TRR 61. The TRR61 demonstrates heterogeneity on the disci-plinary, the cultural and the geographicaldimension, representing an ideal opportuni-ty to investigate cultural impacts on knowled-ge sharing activities.
3 Cultural differences between Chinaand Germany
Based on an analysis of Geert Hofstede (5D-model) concerning five cultural dimensions(Power Distance Index, PDI; Individualism, IDV;Masculinity, MAS; Uncertainty AvoidanceIndex, UAI; Long-Term Orientation, LTO),4 Ger-many and China feature opposed parametervalues in all dimensions, except Masculinity.The scores of China and Germany in Hofste-de´s 5D-model are presented in Figure 1.The PDI of China (80) is higher than the PDI
in Germany (35), indicating a higher level ofinequality of power and wealth in the Chine-se than in the German society. Moreover, inChina subordinates are unlikely to approachand contradict their supervisor in a direct way,while German subordinates will do so morelikely (Hofstede and Hofstede, 2007).The IDV scores are considerably higher in
Germany (67) than in China (20),meaning thatthe German society is oriented towards indi-vidualism and the Chinese society is oriented
4) A detailed description can be found in Hofstede (2007):• “PDI: Power distance is defined as the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a society expect and accept that power is distribu-ted unequally.
• IDV: Individualism is the opposite of collectivism. Individualism stands for a society in which the ties between individuals are loose: a person is expected to look after himself orherself and his or her immediate family only. Collectivism stands for a society in which people from birth onwards are integrated into strong, cohesive in-groups, which conti-nue to protect them throughout their lifetime in exchange for unquestioning loyalty.
• MAS:Masculinity is the opposite of femininity. Masculinity stands for a society in which emotional gender roles are clearly distinct:men are supposed to be assertive, though,and focus onmaterial success;women are supposed to bemore modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of life. Femininity stands for a society in which emotional gen-der roles overlap: both men and women are supposed to be modest, tender, and concerned with the quality of life.
• UAI: Uncertainty avoidance is defined as the extent to which the members of institutions and organizations within a society feel threatened by uncertain, unknown, ambigu-ous, or unstructured situations.
• LTO: Long-term orientation is the opposite of short-term orientation. Long-term orientation stands for a society that fosters virtues oriented towards future rewards, in particu-lar perseverance and thrift. Short-term orientation stands for a society that fosters virtues related to the past and present, in particular respect for tradition, preservation of‘face’, and fulfilling social obligations.”
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towards collectivism. Thus, in the individua-listic Germany tasks always prevail over per-sonal relations and vice versa in the collecti-vistic China. According to Hofstede, Chinese-German cooperation shows differences in soci-al and group orientation, respectively.Whereasthe German managers’ way of thinking andoperating is affected by individualism, Chine-se managers orient their behavior towards col-lectivism (cf. IDV) (Valentine and Godkin, 2001).Basically, this effect is derived from utter-
ly heterogeneous political orientations, as wellas from the importance of the family, traditio-nally founded in the long history of China (Ho,1976). On this basis it is conjecturable that thecollaboration propensity will be more pro-nounced for Chinese (Birnholtz, 2007).China and Germany show equal scores (66)
in masculinity, representing equal occurren-ce of clearly distinct emotional gender roles.In contrast, considerable differences emergein the factor UAI. The scores in the UAI are hig-her in Germany (65) than in China (30). Thisindicates that there are more formal laws,informal rules and work regulations control-ling the rights and duties of individuals in Ger-many than in China. In countries showing alow degree of uncertainty avoidance like China,one believes that many problems can be resol-ved without rules and that rules should onlybe established if absolutely necessary. Further-more, in countries with a high degree of uncer-tainty avoidance orientation individuals liketo be always busy and hard working or at leastlike to be seen so, while in low uncertainty
avoidance countries individuals are able towork hard when needed, but they are not“driven by an inner urge toward constant acti-vity” (Hofstede and Hofstede, 2007).The greatest difference between the Chi-
nese and the German culture according toHofstede is found in LTO. China has the hig-hest score (118) of all countries and Germany(31) is ranked with a low LTO score. Hence, cul-turally based differences between China andGermany in the concept of time are expected.Thereby, in contrast to Germans, Chinese donot think about time in terms of “time ismoney”. Since in China time appears as a rela-tively unlimited and cheap good, Chinese aremore focused on the long-term outcome rat-her than on obtaining short-term success asit is to be found in Western countries (Wilpertand Scharpf, 1990).Besides the Hofstede dimensions, cross-cul-
tural researchers emphasize further impor-tant factors for the Chinese culture, namelyguanxi (simply translated as ‘personal con-nections/relationships’) and the concept offace (Easterby-Smith and Malina, 1999; Ho,1976; Jarman, 2001; Jiwen and James, 2007;Qian et al., 2008; Wilpert and Scharpf, 1990).Further factors affecting cross-cultural colla-borative effectiveness are differing conceptsof quality, differing respect for age and hie-rarchy and the use of third language commu-nication (mainly English) (Wilpert and Scharpf,1990). According to previous research on cross-cultural knowledge sharing, e.g. studies con-ducted by Ardichvili,Michailova and Hutchings
Figure 1 Comparison of Chinese and German scores in Hofstede´s 5D-model.
Power DistanceIndex (PDI)
Individualism (IDV) Masculinity (MAS) Uncertainty Avoi-dance Index (UAI)
Long-Term Orienta-tion (LTO)
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
35
80
67
20
66 66 65
30 31
118
CGermany China
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or Zhang, we argue that guanxi and the con-cept of face exert main impacts on knowled-ge sharing processes (Ardichvili et al., 2006;Michailova and Hutchings, 2006; Zhang et al.,2008). Thus, guanxi and the concept of faceare discussed in detail in the following para-graphs.Guanxi is mostly described as a form of
interpersonal relationships and connectionsunique to the Chinese culture. Due to the highvalue of harmony in the Confucian orientedChinese society, Chinese tend to emphasizegood relationships in their social environment(Qian et al., 2008). Luo describes six traits thatoffer a comprehensive understanding of guan-xi (Luo, 1997). First, guanxi is based on a utili-tarian concept and therefore bonds individualsby exchanging favors rather than feelings. Aguanxi relation not necessarily involvesfriends, however, if possible friends are pre-ferred (Dunning and Kim, 2007). Ties based onguanxi are easily broken when they are notperceived to help in achieving goals. Second,guanxi means reciprocal exchange of favorsand frequently tends to favor the weaker rela-tion partner (Alston, 1989). Third, guanxi istransferable in the way that if A has guanxiwith B, and A has guanxi with C, he can sug-gest B to C or vice versa. Fourth, guanxi is ope-rating on the individual level and thus a highlypersonal concept. Hereby, trust, honesty, reci-procity, respect and social status are the essen-tial features (Davies et al., 1995). In China, inter-personal loyalty is often more important thanorganizational affiliation or legal status (Dun-ning and Kim, 2007). Fifth, guanxi is directedto long-term interpersonal associations andinteractions. Sixth and lastly, guanxi has anintangible quality, i.e. individuals who shareguanxi ties are committed to each other by an“informal and unwritten code of trust, forbea-rance, reciprocity and equity” (Dunning andKim, 2007). Disrespecting the virtues of guan-xi can easily cause serious damage to an indi-vidual’s social standing and respectability.The social standing of an individual is clo-
sely connected to the amount of ‘face’ an indi-vidual can claim for him/herself. Even thoughthe concept of face is universally applicableto rank an individual’s standing in his socialenvironment, the Chinese interpretation offace is specifically oriented to status and fixedrole behavior (Wilpert and Scharpf, 1990).According to Leung and Chan, face is the“respect, pride and dignity of an individual asa consequence of his/her social achievementsand the practice of it” (Leung and Chan, 2003).
Cardon and Scott argue that face in China isan essential component of communicationand relates to a person’s image and status wit-hin a social structure, while Westerners’ viewof face is fairly simple and separated from com-munication (Cardon and Scott, 2003). Face hasversatile characteristics. First, an individual’sface has a certain quantity, which can beincreased by hard work, benefiting society,superior intellectual knowledge, accumulati-on of wealth and exemplary behavior, forinstance (Brunner et al., 1989). Second, facehas a positional aspect, i.e. the face positionof individuals is generated by their social net-work and connections (Hwang, 1982). The lar-ger the network and the more powerful themembers connected to an individual the hig-her the face position. Third, face has a moraldimension, representing the confidence ofsociety in the integrity of an individual’s cha-racter (Leung and Chan, 2003). Fourth, face hasa dimension related to one’s prestige and repu-tation achieved through success and ostenta-tion (Brunner et al., 1989). Fifth, in social inter-actions Chinese generally focus on saving face,giving face and avoiding a loss of face to othersalways under the unwritten law of reciproci-ty (Leung and Chan, 2003; Qian et al., 2008;Wilpert and Scharpf, 1990). Sixth and lastly,face can be transferred, i.e. buying face or bor-rowing face is a common praxis meaning thatan individual may ask another one with a highsocial standing to intervene on his behalf,where the individual has not enough face (Car-don and Scott, 2003). Concluding, one has tonote that Chinese collaboration partners mightuse face-related communication strategies tosave or give face to others, e.g. indirectness,intermediaries on the one hand and praisingor requests on the other (Cardon and Scott,2003). Despite the critics to Hofstede’s surveyand dimensions (for instance: Baskerville, R.F.(2003)) his framework has found broad accep-tance and is often applied in academicresearch.
4 Research construct and hypothesis
The use of collaboration as a tool of sciencebecame an essential prerequisite particular-ly in “big science”, which is characterized bylarge-scale projects dealing with complex,rapidly changing problems and dynamic andhighly specialized knowledge (Galison andHevly, 1992; Hara et al., 2003). Moving fromclosed research to open research or even openinnovation approaches, external knowledge
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sourcing and knowledge sharing becomeimportant requirements for universities (Lich-tenthaler and Ernst, 2006). Often such colla-borations are affected by “diversity of natio-nality, gender, ethnicity or profession” (Melin,2000). Especially geographically distributedcollaborators have to cope with further speci-fic challenges, such as providing effective com-munication channels (e-mail, computer-net-works, phone calls, etc.) and overcoming dif-ficulties in project coordination to assure suc-cess (Birnholtz, 2007; Cummings and Kiesler,2003; Cummings and Kiesler, 2005; Finholt,2003). Otherwise, ideas or information pertai-ning to research and measuring instrumentscannot be exchanged. However, sharingknowledge across long distances still remainscomplicated (McFadyen and Cannella Jr, 2005).
Social Exchange Theory and knowledge sha-ring
Whenever, deciding whether to participa-te in knowledge sharing activities, rationalindividuals will consider costs and benefits ofsuch interactions (Qian et al., 2008). Therefo-re, the Social Exchange Theory (SET) can beemployed to explain such situations. The SETargues that the exchange between individualsis a fundamental form of behavior and basedon cost-benefit principles (Homans, 1961). Fur-thermore, Homans introduced psychologicalconcepts like expectations and rewards andBlau introduced the concept of social reward,bridging the gap between individuals andsociety (Blau, 1964). Thibaut and Kelley pro-pose that e.g. anticipated reciprocity andexpected gain in reputation motivate indivi-duals to participate in social exchange activi-ties (Thibaut and Kelley, 1959). In contrast toeconomic exchange, social exchange occurswithout specific obligations, i.e. roles or con-tracts. Thus, individuals do others a favor viasuch exchanges with the expectation of somefuture return, even without having a definiteguarantee of this return. These characteristicsmatch the knowledge sharing concept. Hence,we argue that knowledge sharing could beregarded as a kind of social exchange.The SET is often applied to knowledge sha-
ring processes as a theoretical basis (Bock etal., 2005; Niedergassel, 2009). Kankanhalliemployed SET to investigate individual beha-vior in knowledge sharing (Kankanhalli et al.,2005). She focused on ‘costs and benefits’ accor-ding to SET for the analysis of incentives andbarriers in knowledge sharing. Chua for instan-
ce employs a multi-person game-theoretic fra-mework, however, he emphasizes reciprocityin knowledge sharing, declaring consistencywith SET (Chua, 2003). Constant et al., usingSET, argue that self-interest is an impedingfactor for knowledge sharing (Constant et al.,1994). Bartol and Srivastava analyze how todesign effective rewards for knowledge sha-ring via social exchange (Bartol and Srivasta-va, 2002).Employing SET in our investigation of
knowledge sharing behavior we conduct aneconomic analysis of noneconomic socialexchanges (Emerson, 1976), thus we argue thatapplying the terms incentives and barriers forknowledge sharing as a noneconomic socialexchange instead of the economic exchangeterms benefits and costs is more appropriate.Hereby, we especially focus on individuals’personal incentives and barriers and culturalimpacts that could enhance or reduce theirintention to share knowledge. Particularly, wedeveloped four hypotheses.In literature, the sense of self-worth seems
to be a main incentive for an individual toshare knowledge. Individuals are more wil-ling to participate in knowledge sharing acti-vities if they believe that their contribution isvalued by others (Cabrera and Cabrera, 2002).Since participants can evaluate the usefulnessof their knowledge through feedback inknowledge sharing activities, they can achie-ve an enhancement of their feeling of self-worth (Bock et al., 2005; Qian et al., 2008). Dueto the individualistic orientation of the Ger-man culture, we argue that the sense of self-worth is more important to Germans than toChinese.Besides, giving and receiving feedback as
a facilitator of knowledge sharing should bemore direct and distinctive in Germany dueto the lower power distance index. Thus wehypothesize:
Hypothesis 1: The sense of self-worth hasa stronger positive influence on the intenti-on to share knowledge in the German groupthan in the Chinese group.
On the contrary, a main barrier could be theloss of knowledge power caused by sharing ofan individual’s unique knowledge. Previousstudies suggested that individuals might beafraid to lose their competitive advantage bysharing knowledge, which they gained littleby little throughout experience, failure andfrustration and which enables them to exceed
their colleagues’ performance (Kankanhalli etal., 2005; Qian et al., 2008). Although knowled-ge sharing could benefit themselves and theproject, those might hold onto their knowled-ge if they believe to receive greater benefitsby doing so (Davenport and Prusak, 2000). Dueto the German tendency towards individual-ism, where everybody looks after himself andindividual success is often more importantthan group success we hypothesize:
Hypothesis 2: The loss of knowledge powerhas a stronger negative influence on the inten-tion to share knowledge in the German groupthan in the Chinese group.
In addition, cultural differences can causedifficulties and asymmetry in knowledge sha-ring (Lam, 1997; Zhang et al., 2008). Due to thedifferent ways in which knowledge and skillsare generated, organized, shared and utilizedin different societal settings, one can expectan impact of culture when it comes to cross-cultural knowledge sharing (Lam, 1997; Zhanget al., 2008). Interpersonal networks and con-nections have an important influence onknowledge sharing (Weir and Hutchings, 2005).Further, social ties, including trust and rap-port have a positive impact on knowledge sha-ring (Qian et al., 2008). Besides, Kotlarsky andOshri argued that guanxi would promoteknowledge sharing between partners (Kotlar-sky and Oshri, 2005). A study conducted byQian et al. in China demonstrates that guan-xi orientation has a positive relationship with
the intention to share knowledge (Qian et al.,2008). Since Chinese are very eager to main-tain good relationships with people in theirenvironment, they have a high guanxi orien-tation. Thus we hypothesize:
Hypothesis 3: The guanxi orientation hasa stronger positive influence on the intenti-on to share knowledge in the Chinese groupthan in the German group.
The amount of face an individual has canvary constantly (Ho, 1976). During the courseof social interactions like knowledge sharingan individual’s face could be enhanced or dimi-nished (Qian et al., 2008). Ardichvili et al. pro-posed that the desire of face saving is a bar-rier in knowledge sharing processes (Ardich-vili et al., 2006). Accordingly, Qian et al. founda negative influence of face saving on theintention to share knowledge in their study(Qian et al., 2008). Individuals could be afraidthat the knowledge they intend to share mightbe incorrect. Hence, sharing incorrect knowled-ge displays their ignorance and would there-by cause a loss of face. Therefore, individualswho try to save face would probably not par-ticipate in knowledge sharing activities. Fur-thermore, in order to save face people mightrestrict their behavior even to the extent ofavoiding contact with others (Qian et al., 2008).Since the concept and the consequences offace are a more salient characteristic of theChinese culture, we hypothesize:
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Hypothesis 4: Face saving has a strongernegative influence on the intention to shareknowledge in the Chinese group than in theGerman group.
Figure 2 summarizes the discussed hypo-theses.
5 Data collection and measures
Due to the fact that our research project ispart of the research objective TRR 61 itself, wehave a unique opportunity to gather data ona chronological sequence of activities thatoccur throughout the collaboration. A stan-dardized online questionnaire was developedin a two stage process. First, a literature reviewwas performed to identify adequate constructs.In the questionnaire, we used existing scaleitems from previous studies where applicableand adapted these to the context of cross-cul-tural academic collaboration where necessa-ry. Regarding the factor sense of self-worth,we employed the scale of Bock et al. (Bock etal., 2005). Loss of knowledge power was mea-sured by the scale of Kankanhalli (Kankanhal-li et al., 2005). Guanxi orientation was mea-sured by the scale of Zuo (Zuo, 2002). We refor-mulated two of the six items to adapt them tothe cross-cultural context. Concerning thefactor face saving we used the scale introdu-ced by Cheung et al. (Cheung et al., 2001). Final-ly, we employed the three-item scale by Ryuto measure the intention to share knowledge(Ryu et al., 2003). The response format was a5-point Likert scale (ranging from 1 ´I stronglydisagree´ to 5 ´I strongly agree´).Second, a pretest was performed by sen-
ding the questionnaire to selected universityscientists, resulting in minimal changes (seeAppendix for an overview of used items andconstructs; the original questionnaire contai-ned additional items not presented in thispaper). All TRR 61 scientists were approachedby personalized emails. A reminding emailwas sent out after 20 days, a second reminderwas sent out after another 20 days and thesurvey was terminated 60 days after our firstapproach. Overall, we could obtain 49 respon-ses, representing a response rate of 80%. 6datasets had to be eliminated due to incom-plete answers, leading to a final sample sizeof N = 43 (nChina = 17; nGermany = 26).
6 Analysis and results
In the first step of our analysis, we con-ducted a factor analysis to determine thestructure of the employed constructs. Unidi-mensionality of the constructs was assessedemploying an exploratory factor analysis. Cron-bach’s alpha values were used to evaluate thereliability of the measures (Cronbach, 1951).We could show unidimensionality for all con-structs except face saving, which did notexceed the commonly suggested thresholdvalue of .70 (see Appendix for factor loadingsand Cronbach’s alphas). However, to maintainthe richness of the analysis, we decided not tofurther purify these constructs. Besides, weassessed the discriminant validity of the con-structs by comparing variance extracted (VE)percentage with the squares of the correlati-on estimates, as proposed by Fornell and Lar-cker (Fornell and Larcker, 1981). Discriminantvalidity could only be demonstrated for lossof knowledge power and guanxi orientation.However, the global criteria and more than50% of partial criteria are met; thus, all con-structs are retained for further analysis.5 Thegoodness-of-fit can be considered acceptablefor the overall model (GFI = .969; AGFI = .960;RMR = .072).Harman’s single factor test was employed
to address the issue of common method bias.The test indicates substantial commonmethodbias if only one single factor emerges fromexploratory factor analysis or one generalfactor accounts for more than 50% of the cova-riance between the measures. We could findneither of these conditions applying Harman’ssingle factor test to our sample.In the second step, we constructed linear
regression models with the intention to shareknowledge as the dependent variable for eachfactor, i.e. sense of self-worth, loss of knowled-ge power, face saving and guanxi orientati-on. Our hypotheses indicate differing impactsof the factors on the intention to shareknowledge depending on the cultural back-ground. Accordingly, a statistical method totest the effect of a variable on the direction orthe strength of a relation between an inde-pendent and a dependent variable is a mode-rator analysis (Baron and Kenny, 1986). In ourmoderator analysis the dependent variable is
5) First generation criteria:Variance explained in Exploratory Factor analysis > 50%, Factor loading > .40, Cronbach’s alpha > .60. Second generation global criteria: GFI > .90, AGFI> .80, RMR < .10. Second generation partial criteria: Item reliability > .40, Construct reliability > .60, Average percentage of variance extracted > .50, fulfillment of Fornell-Larcker cri-terion (Fornell and Larcker, 1981).
38
the intention to share knowledge, the inde-pendent variables are sense of self-worth, lossof knowledge power, face saving and guanxiorientation and the moderating variable isnationality. Further, we followed the frame-work for identifyingmoderator variables deve-loped by Sharma (Sharma et al., 1981). Accor-ding to Hambrick, we conducted Chow teststo test our hypotheses (Hambrick and Lei, 1985).The Chow test for homogeneity of regres-
sion results is a straightforward method toobserve differences in regression results andfound broad acceptance (Hambrick and Lei,1985). First, we ran separate regressions for thetwo subsamples. Second, we ran the regressi-ons for the total sample. The values of inte-rest were the sum of squared errors for thetotal sample and the subsamples. If the errorsobtained from the subsamples are small rela-tive to the errors of the total sample, a mode-rating effect can be assumed. In Table 1, resultsfor the four different regression models arereported.For the interpretation of the Chow test we
used a F-statistic table (Backhaus, 2006). If sig-nificant differences are found, nationality canbe considered a moderator that operatesthrough the error term, often also called ‘homo-logizer’ (Sharma et al., 1981). All variance infla-tion factors (VIFs) in our linear regressionmodels were well below the widely acceptedthreshold value of 10 (Hair, 2006).
Regarding the sense of self-worth, splittinginto subsamples results in an improvement ofthe adj. R2 value in the German subsample anda decrease of the R2 value in the Chinese sam-ple. The standardized regression coefficient ishigher in regressionmodel of the German sub-sample. However, the Chow test was not sig-nificant, thus Hypothesis 1 has to be rejected.The sense of self-worth equally influences theintention to share knowledge in the two sub-samples.For the factor loss of knowledge power we
find considerable differences. Again, we findan improved adj. R2 value in the German anda decreased adj. R2 value in the Chinese sub-sample. Further, we can find the hypothesi-zed negative influence of loss of knowledgepower on the intention to share knowledge inthe total sample and the German subsample,but not in the Chinese subsample, where thisregression model is not significant. The Chowtest is significant at p < .01, supporting Hypo-thesis 2. As expected, the loss of knowledgepower has a negative influence on the inten-tion to share knowledge in the German sub-sample, while the loss of knowledge powerhas no influence on the intention to shareknowledge in the Chinese subsample.Separation into subsamples regarding guan-
xi orientation results in an improvement ofthe model fit in both subsamples. The adjus-ted adj. R2 rises from .705 to .757 in the Chine-
Notes: N = 43; nChina = 17; nGermany = 26; *significant at p < .05; **significant at p < .01; F-values for Chow tests fromBackhaus (2006).
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se subsample and to .711 in the German sam-ple, respectively. The standardized regressioncoefficients as well increase from .844 to .879and .850 in the Chinese and German subsam-ples. The Chow test is significant at the levelof p < .05, providing support for Hypothesis 3.Thus we demonstrated that the influence ofguanxi orientation has a stronger influenceon the intention to share knowledge in theChinese than in the German group. Lastly, we find an improvement of the adj.
R2 value in the Chinese subsample and adecrease of adj. R2 in the German subsample,segmenting into subgroups in the regressionmodel with face saving as the independentvariable. Furthermore, face saving has only asignificant influence on the intention to shareknowledge in the Chinese subsample. Never-theless, none of the three regression modelsdemonstrates the hypothesized negative influ-ence. Additionally the Chow test is not signi-ficant, disproving Hypothesis 4.
7 Discussion and conclusion
This study offers several interesting fin-dings regarding personal and cultural impactson the process of knowledge sharing in cross-cultural collaborative R&D projects. Particu-larly, the regression models allow us to iden-tify success factors and barriers influencingthe intention to share knowledge of collabo-rating researchers, contributing to the exis-ting body of literature by considering an aca-demic and cross-cultural perspective. Further-more, we find considerable differences in theinfluencing factors between Chinese and Ger-man groups that can be related to culturalimpacts.The sense of self-worth demonstrates an
equally positive influence in both subsampleson an individual’s intention to share knowled-ge. However, while the Germans’ individua-listic orientation and the low power distanceindex as a facilitator of giving feedback couldenhance the importance of self-worth in Ger-many, the Chinese desire to gain face as a faci-litator to increase one’s sense of self worthcould explain the importance of this constructin the Chinese group. Nevertheless, we couldshow the importance of sense of self-worthfor the intention to share knowledge in a cross-cultural academic setting, supporting the fin-dings of Bock et al. and Qian et al. (Qian et al.,2008). Hence, researchers in collaborative pro-jects should establish frequent feedbackrounds, in which past knowledge sharing acti-
vities are analyzed in a way that individualssee how their contribution in knowledge sha-ring processes has improved the projects’ per-formance. Such discussions would allow par-ticipants to increase their sense of self-worthand would further have a positive impact ontheir intention to share knowledge, enhan-cing future knowledge sharing activities. Significant differences emerge in the regres-
sion model with loss of knowledge power asthe independent variable. In the German sub-sample we could demonstrate a negative influ-ence of loss of knowledge power on the inten-tion to share knowledge. The German societyis characterized by an individualistic orienta-tion. We argue that this orientation enhancesthe fear of losing competitive advantages, evenin academic settings. On the contrary, in theChinese subsample loss of knowledge powerhas no significant influence on the intentionto share knowledge. However, previousresearch in a Chinese setting could show thatloss of knowledge power has a negative influ-ence in knowledge sharing processes in aneconomic setting (Bock et al., 2005; Qian et al.,2008). Interestingly, we cannot support Qian’sfindings in our academic setting, implyingthat Chinese academic researchers are notafraid to lose competitive advantages throughknowledge sharing. Instead, by sharing supe-rior intellectual knowledge scientists couldgain face, which is highly important in Chine-se societies (Brunner et al., 1989). Besides, Kank-anhalli et al. could not prove their hypothesi-zed negative impact of loss of knowledgepower in knowledge sharing processes in theirsetting either (Kankanhalli et al., 2005). Furt-her examinations regarding setting impactscould give new impetus to the concept’s con-tinuous development. As hypothesized, the guanxi orientation
has a significantly stronger positive influen-ce on the intention to share knowledge in theChinese subgroup. Furthermore, in the Chine-se group guanxi orientation has the strongestinfluence on the intention to share knowled-ge in all regression models, highlighting theoutstanding social relationship orientation.Thus, we could demonstrate that a culturalfactor has a larger impact on knowledge sha-ring processes than personal factors, suppor-ting findings of Qian et al.. As Qian et al. furt-her pointed out, Chinese try to create a har-monious atmosphere, which enables knowled-ge sharing in the first place and facilitates thebuilding of reciprocal relationships (Qian etal., 2008). Surprisingly, the standardized cor-
relation coefficient of .850 in the German sub-sample is also considerably high. Accordingly,social relations have an important influenceon the intention to share knowledge in theGerman subsample, too. Niedergassel, forinstance, demonstrated in a German acade-mic setting that knowledge sharing is enhan-ced if the relationship between collaboratorsis particularly close (Niedergassel and Leker,2009). However, the Chinese guanxi orienta-tion is a unique phenomenon and has to beclosely considered when striving for collabo-ration with Chinese partners. Maintaining agood relationship to Chinese partners byexchanging favors and following the unwrit-ten law of reciprocity is a key strategy for suc-cessful collaboration (Davies et al., 1995; Dun-ning and Kim, 2007; Lockett, 1988; Valentineand Godkin, 2001; Zhang et al., 2008). Finally, we could not demonstrate the hypo-
thesized negative effect of face saving on theintention to share knowledge in neither of thesubgroups. Furthermore, the Chow test is notsignificant, disproving our hypothesis. Thus,we cannot support the findings of Qian et al.,who could demonstrate a negative influenceof face saving and a positive influence of facegaining on the intention to share (Qian et al.,2008). Therefore, we argue that multiple facetsof the concept of face have to be considered.However, Zhang et al. pointed out that savingface is less important to Chinese when inte-racting with foreigners, since one can only loseface to members of one’s social environment(Zhang et al., 2008). Accordingly, Ardichvili etal. argue that the impact of the concept of facewas weaker than expected in their study, too(Ardichvili et al., 2006). They suggest, that Chi-nese feel rather comfortable asking questionsand contributing to discussions if such inter-actions improve project performance (Ardich-vili et al., 2006). Further, Ardichvili et al. rea-son that face saving is more a concern for olderChinese (Ardichvili et al., 2006). Nevertheless,we still believe that the concept of face has astrong impact on any interaction in collabo-rative activities with Chinese partners. Thus,we emphasize that one should carefully focuson consequences and implications of face,when collaborating with Chinese partners. Forinstance, giving face, i.e. doing something thatenhances someone else’s reputation or pres-tige by praising, gift giving or concessions canimprove the performance of collaborationswith Chinese partners (Cardon and Scott, 2003). While offering many interesting findings,
this study also possesses some limitations
requiring consideration. Our study is based ona comparatively small sample size and we focu-sed on a knowledge generation oriented aca-demic setting, thus generalizing our results toeconomic situations may not be appropriate.However, we will conduct qualitative inter-views to support the findings of our quanti-tative analysis. Besides, we especially focusedon Chinese cultural factors, though futureresearch should investigate cultural characte-ristics of western societies that might influ-ence knowledge sharing processes. Generally,strategies, non-monetary rewarding and incen-tive systems facilitating knowledge sharingshould be developed and discussed more dee-ply. Despite the limitations we still believe to
make a valuable contribution to the existingbody of literature on cross-cultural knowled-ge sharing in innovation, technology and col-laboration management, particularly consi-dering the academic partners´ point of viewand the increasing importance of collaborati-ve activities with partners from China.
Acknowledgement
The author would like to thank the GermanResearch Foundation (DFG) for financial sup-port of this project within the TransregionalCollaborative Research Centre TRR 61.
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Sharing my knowledge makes me lose my unique value in the organization. .810
Sharing my knowledge makes me lose my power base in the organization. .892Sharing my knowledge makes me lose my knowledge that makes me stand out with respect toothers. .909
Sharing my knowledge makes me lose my knowledge that no one else has. .862
I will make an effort to share knowledge with my colleagues. .924
I intend to share knowledge with my colleagues when they ask. .914
I will share knowledge with my colleagues. .951
Notes: N = 43; Confirmatory factor analysis was performed using AMOS 16.0. Goodness-of-fit measures for the overallmeasure model are: GFI = .969; AGFI = .960; RMR =.072.
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Introduction
Scientific and technological novelties havealways been challenging for mankind. Newtechnology brings with it numerous opportu-nities and great apprehension. In this context,there is a natural interest in emerging tech-nologies, such as biotech, cognitech and nano-
tech. If, on the one hand, new technologicalapplications normally offer increased oppor-tunities, higher living standards, and lead tothe redefinition of social and cultural para-digms, on the other hand, as they lead to thebreakdown of previous social rules, they alwayscreate a sensation of discomfort and insecu-rity.
Research SectionTechnological trajectories and multidimensio-nal impacts: further remarks on the nanotech-nology industry
Paulo Antônio Zawislak*, Luis FernandoMarques**,Priscila Esteves*** and Fernanda Rublescki****
The article discusses various views on the emergence and impacts of nanotechno-logy. It proposes a multidimensional framework for analyzing the different tech-nological, economical, environmental and social dimensions of nanotechnology.The researchmethod consists of a three step investigation of both the positive andnegative impacts of nanoscience and nanotechnology on different Brazilian sta-keholders. From the insights providedbyagroupof experts itwaspossible to designa survey instrument thatwasapplied to 59Braziliannanobiotechnology researchers.The survey results show that, on the onehand,nanotechnology is expected to leadto economic development,product development,business competitiveness,greaterjob specialization, less pollution, improvements to the health system and exten-ded life expectancy. On the other hand, however, nanotechnologymay cause spe-cific forms of contamination due to nanotechnological manipulation, more lay-offs, massive industrial restructuring, and other potential risks. Both perspectiveswould suggest the need for a regulatory framework to deal with the uncertaintyand ensure a regular pathway for the stakeholders to be able to exploit this tech-nology to its full potential.
* Graduate Center on Business Administration, School of Management, Federal University of RioGrande do Sul, PPGA/EA/UFRGS, RuaWashington Luiz, 855, Porto Alegre, RS, 90.010-000, Brazil,[email protected]
** Graduate Center on Business Administration, School of Management, Federal University of RioGrande do Sul, PPGA/EA/UFRGS, RuaWashington Luiz, 855, Porto Alegre, RS, 90.010-000, Brazil,[email protected]
*** Graduate Center on Business Administration, School of Management, Federal University of RioGrande do Sul, PPGA/EA/UFRGS, RuaWashington Luiz, 855 , Porto Alegre, RS, 90.010-000, Brazil,[email protected]
**** Graduate Center on Business Administration, School of Management, Federal University of RioGrande do Sul, PPGA/EA/UFRGS, RuaWashington Luiz, 855, Porto Alegre, RS, 90.010-000, Brazil,[email protected]
Technological trajectories and multidimensional impacts: further remarks on thenanotechnology industry
47
It is essential to prepare the scientific com-munity so that it can provide up-to-date infor-mation and new insights to facilitate the dis-semination of any new technology, reducingthe risk of misunderstanding either the bene-fits or the negative impacts. As an example,Shellenberger & Nordhaus (2004) have shownthat environmental research failed to forecastnegative impacts (such as global warming).Another example was the alarming delay bet-ween the onset of the social and economicimpacts of GMOs (genetically modified organ-isms) and the initiation of the scientific deba-te on the subject.
The last five years have seen a significantgrowth in nanoscience and nanotechnologydevelopments from academic publications andpatents to multiple industrial and economicapplications. The benefits are extendedthrough new applications in chemistry,mate-rials, electronics, computing, medicine andpharmaceuticals, among others. Due to itsoverall and horizontal range of applications,nanotechnology has already become inevita-ble.
The expected positive impacts of nanotech-nology range from a technological revolutionin the manufacturing process, new employ-ment skills, and the emergence of new indus-tries, to a variety of economic opportunities.However, many of the expected impacts arenot exactly clear to the different stakeholders.Moreover, doubts still remain regarding thesafety of the nanotechnology for human healthand the ecological system. It is claimed thatthe nanometric size of newmolecular structu-res in itself represents a threat due to the easewith which their action mechanism can spre-ad within life systems, causing contaminati-on and toxicity.
Given this, there is an urgent need to dis-cuss the ways in which social, environmentaland economic certainty can be increased. It isour belief that such changes could be bettermonitored and harmful effects better predictedand controlled, if an enhanced concept of Free-man & Perez´s (1988) techno-economic para-digm, based on the multidimensional inter-linking of agents and different outcomes, isused.
Evolutionary Economics (Dosi, 1991; Pavitt,1992) suggests that any on-going technologyis dependent on a path, in which it is possibleto foresee its future development. In the caseof a new technology it is harder to predict theirdevelopment path as their path is unknown.The lack of knowledge and the inherent uncer-
tainty of any new venture certainly enhancedoubt and create fear. Any new technologywill obviously engender both positive andnegative impacts. To better understand thisissue, it is necessary to understand the entirephenomenon from a technical/economic per-spective, while it is also imperative to incor-porate new dimensional sights, such as thesocial and the environmental perspectives.
This paper proposes to identify, throughextensive research carried out within the Bra-zilian nanobiotechnology research network,the potential benefits and threats to the eco-nomy, society and environment offered by theemergence of nanoscience and nanotechno-logy.
This paper includes five more sections: Thenext, section two, will address the emergen-ce of new technologies in general. Section threefocuses on the path of nanotechnology and itspositive and negative impacts. Sections fourand five are dedicated, respectively, to themethodology and the results obtained fromthe research effort made during 2004 and 2008.The final remarks are in section six.
The Emergence of New Technologiesand Development
The Schumpeterian tradition suggests thatthe successful spread of innovation throug-hout the economy and society will generate anew cycle, value creation and wealth. Freemanand Perez (1988) defined any major new tech-nological breakthrough as a new techno-eco-nomic paradigm.
This kind of analysis, in which differentrevolutionary periods are perceived primari-ly from a techno-economical perspective, hasproven to be of limited use when dealing withthe complexity of the real world (Perez, 1993).That is why, for example, it was hard for envi-ronmentalists to predict impending events,such as global warming and biotech hazar-dous products, of recent industrial innovati-ons. Ignoring precise test validation, compa-nies violated ethical principles and only con-sidered economic returns (Shellenberger andNordhaus, 2004; ETC Group, 2004).
In order to deal with a complex world, sig-nificant changes are required to the definiti-on of development when attempting to under-stand an emerging new technology. The cur-rent debate, which is actually contributingtowards broadening that definition, is prima-rily focused on research into sustainable deve-lopment (Asheim, Buchholz and Tungodden,
In fact, depending on the intensity of theinnovation cycle, both positive and negativeimpacts are felt over a multitude of dimensi-ons. If it is intense, as in the case of revolutio-nary technologies, the impacts are not res-tricted only to the economic dimension, butwill certainly extend to other dimensions, suchas the social and environmental ones.
In order to copewith these nonlinear impactflows, it is important to provide a general con-cept to incorporate them. Since the classicaldefinition of the techno-economic paradigmonly partially fulfils the task, Zawislak et al(2006, p.4) have enlarged the concept of deve-lopment as to be:
“a set of actions that can ensure the bestconditions for mankind’s survival, which canbe deployed into different dimensions, suchas better tools and techniques to solve pro-blems (technological dimension), an increasein wealth generation (economic dimension),wide comprehensive welfare for the society
(social dimension), and natural resource con-servation (environmental dimension).”
This multidimensional approach (i.e. tech-nological and economic dimensions plus soci-al and environmental ones) better reflects thecomplexity of the contemporary technologyscenario.
This approach emphasizes the role of dif-ferent relevant agents, such as the individual,organizations, or groups of organizations, asengines for and/or the consequence of change.This situation suggests that the scope of ana-lysis that explains the existence and the sys-temic role of any individual or organizationshould be enlarged to consider their differentinterlinkages (Nielsen, 2001). If, on the onehand, these actors may fulfil a more signifi-cant role in a certain dimension, on the otherhand, they can also play simultaneous rolesin different dimensions. The major stakehol-ders are universities and public research cen-tres, companies, the State, consumers, citizensand non-governmental organizations (NGOs)(Marques, 2008).
Technological trajectories and multidimensional impacts: further remarks on thenanotechnology industry
Figure 1 Multidimensional model for the analysis of the impacts of new technology
→
→→ → →→ →→ →→ →→ →→ →→ →→→→→ →
→
→
→
→→
→→
→→ →→ →→TechnologicalDimension
EconomicDimension
SocialDimension
EnvironmentalDimension
Universities andPublic Research
CentresState Companies Consumers Citizens NGO’s
→→ →Cross-dimensionalinteraction
Influence Scopeof na Actor
Technologytrajectory
49
This complex system is better understoodby considering the cross impacts of the diffe-rent dimensions and their respective interlin-ked stakeholders, who undergo possible gene-ral effects (both positive and negative) of anew technological trajectory. Figure 1 showshow the multidimensional model for the ana-lysis of new technology impacts works.
Since we are dealing with technologicalimpacts, technology itself is the primary driverin the achievement of economic development.From this multidimensional perspective andconsidering that new technology is increa-singly general purpose in nature, its diffusi-on throughout society normally leads to (Bres-naham & Trajtemberg, 1995; Carlaw & Lipsey,2002; Carlaw et. al, 2005):
1) more complex forms, with undeniableincreases in productivity;
2) a new range of applications;3) a wide range variety of economic results;4) and the emergence of a diversity of new
products and technological processes.
However, many different paths can be fol-lowed. First, the use of new technology impliespositive effects in the economic dimension,by establishing productivity growth andwealth creation (Schumpeter, 1934; Solow, 1957;Nelson &Winter, 1982). Second, it also impliesnegative effects like, the disappearance of eco-nomic sectors, increases in new investments,the exclusion of existing businesses in themarket, as well as more difficulty on distribu-ting wealth, generating employment and stan-dards of competence (Tobin, 1989; Furtado,2001).
In order to fully comprehend the phenome-non, besides understanding the impacts ofnew technology on the economic dimension,it is also necessary to understand how it affectsthe social and the environmental dimensions.
Normally, the mainstream society continu-es to follow as old concept of development thatadheres to a different pattern of generatingsocial benefits and exploiting natural resour-ces. But as new industries and products emer-ge, a new social structure is needed. New cul-tural behaviour and attitudes change expecta-tions and profiles. It is as if a new kind of socie-ty emerges within the old as a result of newtechno-economic trends. New behaviour alsoleads to new environmental impacts.
Martinet and Reynaud (2004) have shown,for example, that deforestation for commer-cial use has impacted on water resources, soil
and world climate; in some regions, the loo-ming desertification has caused soil erosionand infertility, the extinction of species, andshrinkage of the agricultural area. In fact, theimpacts are all interlinked, and generate sig-nificant direct and indirect technological costs,and the emergence of new sub-patterns andthe search for new technical solutions.
In the opinion of experts, nanotechnologyis an emerging general purpose technology.The forthcoming nanorevolution needs to bebetter understood (Carlaw et al. 2005; Elsi,2005; Roco & Bainbridge, 2006).
Nanotechnology: Trajectories andImpacts
Nanotechnology is the group of technolo-gies resulting from scientific discoveries madein different fields of knowledge, such as che-mistry, physics, biology, material and compu-tational engineering, where the dimension ofmanipulation is nanometric (Nanologue, 2006).In essence, nanotechnology consists in the abi-lity to manipulate matter at an atomic scale,in order to create structures with a differen-tiated molecular organization and differentproperties (Crandall, 1997).
Regarding that material property, nano-technology has the potential of creating seve-ral technical applications with impacts inmany different economic sectors. One exam-ple is the carbon nanotube that promise toenable lighter, stronger materials that can beused in civil construction, heavy machinery,car manufacturing, electronics industry andso many others (Nanologue, 2006). This varie-ty of applications makes it difficult to evalua-te and measure the impacts of nanotechnolo-gy using the traditional linear view (NIST, 1999;Royal Society/Royal Academy of Engineering,2004).
When analyzing the development of nano-technology and its various spill-overs, publi-shing (articles) and patenting (number ofpatents) are interesting ways of measuringthe timelag that occurs between the publica-tion of scientific findings to the patenting oftechnological applications (Zucker & Darby,2005).
This timelag can be clearly seen by compa-ring the number of articles and patents invol-ving nanotechnology vis a vis biotechnology
Paulo Antônio Zawislak, Luis Fernando Marques, Priscila Esteves and FernandaRublescki
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(of which Genetically Modified Organisms isa significant example), as shown in Figure 2below.
Between 1983 and 1990, the number of arti-cles dealing with nanoscience and nanotech-nology grew exponentially, doubling roughlyevery 7.3 years. Between 1991 and 2005, howe-ver, the rate of new publications increasedconsiderably, doubling every 3.3 years (Zuckerand Darby, 2005; Kaiser, 2006). With biotech-nology research and applications, the resultsare almost the same: exponential growth.Observing the biotech time lag pattern, it isinteresting to note that there was an increa-se in number of related patents several yearsafter the expansion in the number of newpapers.
By following the trends shown in Figure 2,the same pattern can be expected to take placewith nanotechnology.
This idea is reinforced by Zanetti-Ramosand Creczynski-Pasa (2007) for whom the gro-wing number of articles published suggestssignificant investments in research. Conse-quently, Fishbine (2002) claims that researchstimulates investments in nanotechnologiesreaching figures that surpass billions of dol-lars.
Research leads to new investment and sti-mulates new entrants in the business of nanos-cience and nanotechnology. According to Kin-gon et al. (2004), in 1999 the number of newentrants whose main products or services werebased on nanotechnology was around 100.However, this figure has now surpassed 1,000in only 3 years. Moreover, according to Alves(2004), 15 years from now, the estimated annu-al production of products based on nanotech-nology will be in the range of 1 trillion dollars,a value that will require the employment ofat least 2 million workers in this sector.
These figures are sufficiently important todraw attention to the debate on the predicta-bility of nanotechnology. It is particularlyimportant since the expected negative impactsof nanotechnology include applications thatwould be potentially harmful to mankind, suchas the capacity to build mass destructionweapons (Marques, 2008). These potentialnegative impacts cast doubt on the safety ofnanotechnology in terms of human health andvarious biological chains (Nanologue, 2006).
Years from Base Year (1986 for Nanotech, 1973 for Biotech)
nano articles
nano patents
biotech articles
biotech patents
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just related to size but, instead, whether it issafe and controllable. This has led to a newdebate, which addresses the consequences ofthe nanotechnology. This debate covers thetechnological, economic, social and environ-mental dimensions of the impacts of nano-technology.
Regarding the technological dimension, itis necessary to asses the impact on the paceof progress in nanoscience and the diversityof its technological applications. This evoluti-on will raise the level of professional skills andenhance scientific discoveries and future sce-narios for the nanotechnology trajectory.
Regarding the possible variables involvedin the economic impact of nanotechnology onthe various agents it is necessary to considerthe level of economic development, the ave-rage level of profitability, the degree of opti-mization of the use of inputs, the average pri-ces of new products in relation to those of aprevious technological generation, the levelof manual labour required to establish the newparadigm, as well as the cost of living and inco-me distribution.
The social dimension involves the impactof nanotechnology on the level of employmentin various economic sectors, the level of wel-fare created, and the progress made with itsapplication in human health.
Finally, the environmental dimension con-cerns the degree of environmental pollution,the degree of contamination, the destructionof different existing biomes and the conser-vation of natural resources.
This complex scenario demands a new regu-latory framework to control the pace of nano-technological development in a fair manner.If such a regulatory framework is delayed,nanotechnology could come to be seen in anegative light. It is necessary to stress that aregulatory framework may lose its capacity toguide the development of the technology, thusbecoming incapable of controlling its spreadand that of its associated dangers.
To prevent such an “unstoppable” trend, itis worth carrying out a cross study of the majorevents that have characterized the emergen-ce of previous revolutionary technologies. Theopinions of experts and the perceptions of theactors involved are useful in identifying themost relevant impacts of nanotechnology andrepresent an important guideline for a futu-re regulatory framework.
Important questions are raised within thisdebate such as: what are the major impactsemerging from nanotechnology? When will
they occur? What is the right timing for regu-lation?
Methodology
In an effort to analyze the technologicaltrajectory of nanotechnology and its possibleimpacts a two-fold, in-depth study and a sur-vey were carried out. The research was con-ducted in three different stages between Octo-ber 2004 and May 2008. In the first stage,experts in nanotechnology, from various ana-lytical perspectives, were asked to identify thepotential impacts of nanotechnology. In thesecond stage, a survey was conducted amongthe researchers belonging to the BrazilianNanobiotechnology Network. The third stageconsisted in an effort at reconfirming the databy interviewing businessmen involved in andaffected by the application of nanotechnolo-gy.
Sixteen experts from diverse fields ofknowledge and experience were interviewed.They were selected in a non-probabilistic wayfrom the areas of basic sciences, engineering,social sciences, ethics, politics, and represen-tatives of non-governmental and commercialorganizations. The experts were: 6 researchers(Biotechnology, Physics, Chemistry, Materials,Pharmacology, Sociology); 1 catholic priest whois a federal congressman; 1 federal judge; 1international NGO representative; 6 Braziliangovernment representatives (from CNPq, FINEP,2 MCT, MMA and Embrapa); and 1 business-man.
They were interviewed using a semi-structured questionnaire dealing with thepotential impacts of nanotechnology that, intheir opinion, may actually occur.
From the collected data, a set of impactswas listed showing the potential generaleffects from nanotechnology on the techno-logical, economic, social and environmentaldimensions. This list gave rise to 35 statementsthat were used in the survey instrument.
SSttaaggee 22:: SSuurrvveeyy
The focus of this survey was the Nanobio-technology Network, which operated between2003 and 2005, with members from 18 natio-nal and state institutions from eight Brazili-an states
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In an effort to facilitate the understandingthe interlinked effects, the statements rela-ting to the application of nanoscience andnanotechnology were limited to the field ofnanobiotechnology, and two specific econo-mic sectors: cosmetics and pharmaceuticals.Both sectors have a high level of R&D invest-ment (around 10% of sales) and also, due tothe already mastered scientific capability ofdesigning new molecular structures, are acce-lerating the launch of new products.
The sample consisted of members of theBrazilian Nanobiotechnological Network (aninstitutional research and development net-work formed by the Brazilian National Coun-cil for Scientific and Technological Develop-ment – CNPq – of the Ministry of Science andTechnology – MCT). The Network consists of92 PhD researchers; 59 of whom returned thequestionnaire (64% return rate). They werecontacted by telephone and e-mail in order toreduce time and costs involved.
The sample profile shows that 93.2% of sur-veyed researchers are primarily related topublic institutions, and the remaining 6.8%related to private institutions.
Regarding the type of institution, 86.4% arefrom universities, 11.9% from technology cen-tres and 1.7% from foundations. By using theLattes-CNPq database it was possible to iden-tify each professor’s areas of knowledge inrelation to nanotechnology (Lattes, 2006). Thus,researchers with recognised expertise in phy-sics constitute 25.4% of respondents, chemis-try 22%, biology 33.9% and pharmacology 18.6%.
Using the data collected in stage I, a sur-vey instrument (questionnaire) was elabora-ted which included a four-step Likert scale,where the level of agreement of the respon-dent varied from a lower limit, represented bythe number one (1) –meaning “I totally dis-agree” – to an upper limit, represented by thenumber four (4) – meaning “I totally agree”.The use of this scale required the researcherto position himself in relation to a determin-ed aspect of the subject. Appendix shows thegeneral results (percantage) for all statements.Furthermore, the results will be presented asmeans (m) and standards-deviation (s) of thetotal of responses to the four-step Likert scale.
The statements followed the order of themultidimensional model, where the first partdealt with the technological dimension, follo-wed, in sequence, by the economic, social andenvironmental dimensions.
The second exploratory in-depth study wasconducted with five representatives from com-panies within the cosmetic and pharmaceu-tical industries. It was decided to restrict theresearch to companies geographically estab-lished in Brazil.
This phase consisted on comparing the out-comes from the survey (scientific and techno-logical-based study) with the points of viewoffered by the companies (profit-orientedimpression) in order to deal with real possi-ble effects and impacts of nanotechnology onthe dimensions under consideration.
In order to identify companies with in-house R&D into nanotechnology that couldprovide representatives for interviews the Bra-zilian Innovation Agency (FINEP) was consul-ted. As a result, five companies were selectedand their respective representatives were inter-viewed using a semi-structured questionnai-re.
Analysis of the Results
The analysis of the results is divided intothree sections. First, the impacts, as perceivedby the experts in the interviews are presen-ted and then divided into seven domains. Inthe second section, the survey statistics aredescribed following the order of the four nano-technology impact dimensions, the impactson stakeholders, and the need for a regulato-ry framework for nanotechnology. The finalsection shows the perceptions of entrepre-neurs in relation to potential impacts of nano-technology.
The research findings shows that nanotech-nology affects the stakeholders involved bothpositively and negatively. However, althoughit is impossible to identify the full consequen-ces, it is possible to outline a set of doubleimpacts that may be used to establish a futu-re regulatory framework.
The following section contains a summa-ry of the foreseen impacts. As can be seen, newbusinesses, new products and new materialswill certainly lead to new productions systemsand yet unknown social impacts.
Integration and substitution of technologyNanotechnology will provide a wide range
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of new applications, based on either in-usetechnology or completely new applications.As a general purpose technology, nanotech-nology is fully able to create or to enhancenovelty within almost every scientific domain.
New scientific research areas, new kinds ofraw materials, new products and new indus-tries, will lead to a new individual, organiza-tional and collective behaviour.
The replacement of existing principles andtechniques is, perhaps, the most importantimpact. Obsolescence will affect business com-petiveness, employment perspectives and soci-al wealth. Since it is almost impossible tomechanically replace obsolete technologicaland competence structures for new ones, out-dated knowledge and practices will be erasedfrom different communities. It is unlikely, forexample, that the workers from the traditio-nal metal-casting industry will simply beemployed by new steel injection companies.
The cost of the shift to a new educationaland professional paradigm will change Stateand university institutional structures. Once-valued skills may not necessarily be applica-ble to new technology.
New products and businessThe new technological standards will cer-
tainly change the way in which matter is mani-pulated. Since nanotechnology deals with phy-sical structures at the molecular level, a wholerange of new products can be imagined anddeveloped. As a consequence of this techno-logical innovation, a variety of new busines-ses will emerge.
Not only new companies with, as yetunknown, new product alternatives, but alsoexisting businesses will profit from the oppor-tunities provided. R&D capabilities will reachnew levels, both in terms of the specific skillsof personnel and in terms of laboratory structu-res, thus requiring greater expenditure on R&D.Sectors and companies with less investmentcapability will tend to fall behind in this newtechnological trajectory.
Since nanoscience and nanotechnology arenew fields, companies will certainly need toestablish new patterns of open innovationwith universities and technocentres. Equally,to avoid the misuse of principles and techni-ques, research and laboratory procedures willneed to be redesigned.
New products will lead to new patterns ofconsumer behaviour. It is expected that newproducts will appear with significant advan-tages in terms of quality, reliability and price.
However, major doubts have emerged in rela-tion to the issue of consumption. Since parti-cle manipulation is the very essence of nano-technology, consumers may be exposed to dif-ferent and unknown forms of contaminationand environmental change. The risk to healthis greater the more invasive is the product,such as food, drugs or cosmetics.
State agencies, NGOs and citizen’s organi-zations will face new challenges to under-stand, prevent and avoid any possible negati-ve impacts.
Extraction of raw material One of the most important positive impacts
is the complete change in the supply of rawmaterials. Nanotechnology has the potentialto replace traditional extraction by syntheticproduction and, thus, to effectively reduce envi-ronmental impacts. This touches on one of thebasic pillars of capitalism, i.e. the exacerbateduse of natural sources of inputs.
According to the experts, this major shiftwill completely change the structure of valuechains. Reductions in raw material and logis-tics costs, as well as in other transaction costswill to lead to a reorientation of business stra-tegies. There will be a shift from supply todemand oriented strategies, where new pro-ducts, with new price relations, will becomeeasier to obtain, not only because they maybecome cheaper, but also due to the reducti-on in procurement and sales.
New materials, new logistic and operatio-nal structures, new products and new consu-mer behaviour will give rise to new industri-al production chains, where productivity, effi-ciency, quality and cost will reach new stan-dards.
However, as with any new production pro-cess, the extraction of the raw material deman-ded by nanotechnology will require new safetyand hazard-free structures. As yet there are nostandardized technical procedures to ensuresafety with nanomanipulation; therefore nano-production is certainly one of the major chal-lenges to be overcome. Universities, researchcentres, industrial organizations and NGOshave a key role to play in this quest.
Changes in the mode of production of com-mon products
Nanoproduction, as stated above, is one of– if not - the major challenge for business ven-tures seeking to take advantage of nanotech-nology. While new materials, new applicati-ons and new products are perfectly imagina-
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ble, the problem remains as to how to use,apply and produce them.
It is not merely a question of quality or pro-ductivity. It is more a question of how to con-cretely produce stable nanometric structures.Size has not yet been fully mastered and manynanoproducts are still micrometric products.Moreover, there is still a knowledge gap in rela-tion to inert and active matter. While newnanoelectronic devices have already been suc-cessfully produced in the semiconductor indus-try, there remains a problem in bionanotech-nology sectors, such as chemicals.
University-based scientific research, espe-cially in engineering, will face great challen-ges in the next ten years. Society, as a whole,is still waiting for new nanoproduction tech-nologies. Until then, traditional productionprocess will be adapted to new nanotechno-logy products. And here lies a high risk of crea-ting a negative impact, as traditional producti-on processes may not be fully adequate to dealwith nanometric structures. In the cosmeticindustry, the unstable scale of the nanometricliposome in dermocosmetics can be expensi-ve for costumers or harmful for human health,since if they are too big they may be useless,while, if too small, they may reach the blood-stream and produce undesirable side effects.
It will be difficult for State regulatory agen-cies to deal with such uncertainties.
Impact of automation on employmentAs a result of the challenges that come with
nanoproduction, automation seems to be abso-lutely necessary to achieve competitive pro-ductivity and high quality standards in nano-metric products. Since it is almost impossibleto use traditional manufacturing procedures,labour tasks will certainly change.
Even highly trained personnel will proba-bly find themselves out of the work. On theone hand, the above-mentioned gap betweenscientific knowledge and technical practice ishard to be filled using their existing skills. Onthe other hand, there is still a lack of peoplewith sufficient experience in the new techno-logy to efficiently work in nanoproduction.
Because of the rapid pace at which nano-technology is being adopted in many sectors,new investment will probably be much moreequipment oriented then competence orient-ed. Therefore, nanotechnology is likely to redu-ce job generation and so affect welfare andundermine social relations.
Here, government and NGOs seem to havean important role; in developed countries, to
avoid high rates of unemployment and, inemerging economies, to guarantee balancedinvestments in new technology and new indus-trial sectors.
Generation of hazardous particlesThis is, perhaps, the classic negative impact.
The “nanofear” effect is based much more onignorance than on reality. The popular ideathat nanostructures will invade human bodiesand then dominate the world is science ficti-on, but there are hazards involved.
Since people lack of information, consumerbehaviour will remain sceptical. This certain-ly affects the demand for new products and,thus, the success of the new companies basedon nanoproduction. In fact, the ease with whichnanoparticles could penetrate living systems,both human and natural resources, couldeffectively cause damage to health, contami-nation, pollution and degradation. However,the extent to which this can happen is not fullymeasurable. For example, as has happenedwith agro-toxins, cumulative and chroniceffects may only come to light many yearslater.
Once again, in this area regulatory agen-cies and NGOs have a major role to play. TheState should increase expenditure on research,prevention and control, while NGOs shoulddedicate themselves to gathering relevantinformation and increasing public awareness.This is why a new regulatory framework isurgent.
Until further information is available, thecare taken by civil society will prevail overblind confidence in this new technology.
Impact on health systemsHere, once again, there is an evident dou-
ble effect. The discovery of new medical pro-cedures and drugs are the most valuable deve-lopments of nanoscience, though, at the sametime, the risk of contamination remains high.
On the one hand, medical research is poin-ting to a whole new world of possibilities. Newtreatments, new cures, new devices, new tech-niques can and will make use of new nanos-cience and nanotechnology-based develop-ments and devices. Moreover, further exten-ding the human life span is a long-held dreamof mankind. Improved human health and lifequality are without doubt the most hoped out-comes of nanotechnology.
On the other hand, if this is achieved, socie-ty as a whole and the State will benefit. Publichealth services will enhance quality and redu-
Technological trajectories and multidimensional impacts: further remarks on thenanotechnology industry
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ce expenditure, since new upcoming nano-based treatments are expected to be more accu-rate than existing procedures. That is why mostR&D expenditure made by private companiesis still being cantered on the medical, phar-maceutical and cosmetic industries.
TThhee SSuurrvveeyy
In this stage of the study, 35 statements –that were based on the experts opinions, refer-ring to both the positive and negative impactsof nanotechnology, and that were formulatedinto a survey instrument which was sent tothe Brazilian nanobiotechnology networkresearchers – are presented one by one accor-ding to their specific dimensions.1
Technological DimensionFrom the data collected, for example, the
mean of the responses to the first statementshows that the researchers tend to believe (m= 2.6) that nanotechnology can provide unli-mited solutions to many of the problems facedby society, and almost all (m = 3.9) believe thatresearch in nanotechnology will open newfrontiers for knowledge and new scientific dis-coveries (see Table 1).
Regarding the impact of nanotechnologyon the process of product development, mostof the researchers (m = 2.93) believe that thetime between a product’s development and itslaunch will be reduced.
Yet, the analysis of the standard deviationshows that there is wide variance in theresponses to the majority of the statementsconcerning the technological dimension, whichmay suggest a certain level of doubt in relati-on to the real potential of nanotechnology,notably in terms of what products will looklike.
Economic DimensionMost of the researchers strongly believe
that nanotechnology will stimulate the growthof new industries and the disappearance ofold ones, it will also require investment in pro-fessional training for future employees, andwill increase R&D expenditure (see the resultsin Table 2)
Moreover, they believe that nanotechnolo-gy could increase the level of employment inthe economy, since most of the researchersdisagree that nanotechnology will be a factorleading to the exclusion of the low-income-population (m = 1.85).
Another aspect pointed out by theresearchers was that the expense involved intreating waste from nanotechnology will belower when compared to other technologies(m = 1.94). It may also lead to a rise in spen-ding on health care, as nanotechnological pro-ducts will be more expensive than conventio-nal products.
In contrast, the researchers strongly belie-ve in the need for investments in nanotech-
1) Statistical tests were applied to cross-reference data. The first set of statistical tests used was intended to verify whether the sample was subject to a normal distribution. Thus,the homogeneity test and the Kolgomorov-Smirnov test showed that in all the research questions the answers did not show normal distribution. Hence, the nonparametric Krus-kal-Wallis test was applied, because statistical techniques are best suited for use with small samples in the absence of normal distribution (MENDENHALL, 1990). The Kruskal-Wallis test revealed the existence of statistically significant differences in the responses from the surveyed researchers due to their different fields of knowledge. The test show-ed that all the questions received answers of little statistical significance (p> 0.01), concluding that there are differences in responses between the knowledge areas surveyed inall dimensions.
Table 1 Technological Dimension
ImpactsMean (m)from 1 to 4
StandardDeviation (s)
Offers unlimited solutions to many of the society’s problems. 2.60 0.89
Nurtures technological integration at levels previously unimaginable. 3.50 0.68
Opens new research and knowledge frontiers. 3.90 0.31
Requires the creation of new laboratory procedures. 3.36 0.70
Creates a path for the raw material synthesis. 3.19 0.61
May reduce the development time of a new product. 2.93 0.70
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nology-qualified-labour (m = 3.65). In the in-depth interviews (stage 1), labour representa-tives mentioned that such investment will notbe only operational but also technological, thatis, the workers performing routine activitiesin the production process will be affected aswell as higher ranking staff, and the techni-cal positions will have to hold the necessaryknowledge in nanotechnology.
The economic dimension also revealed awide range of responses to most of the state-ments. This demonstrates the difficulty invol-ved in forming a position about the potentialof a new technology. This happens because ofthe certainty that nanotechnology demandshigher investments in professional qualifica-tion (m = 3.67), due to the variation in the phy-sical properties of matter, which leads to aneed for greater knowledge specialization.
Environmental DimensionThere is considerable doubt regarding the
possible environmental impacts (see Table 3).The interviewed researchers believe in reducti-on of pollution in general (m = 2.88). Moreo-ver, they disagree that nanotechnology isharmful to the human race and to the envi-ronment (m = 1.79), and with a high level ofuncertainty (s = 0.88) they tend to disagreethat nanotechnology will induce higher envi-ronmental consciousness and researcher ethics(m = 2.25).
The standard deviation among the envi-ronmental issues is high, which demonstra-tes a certain degree of uncertainty about thepotential benefits of the new technology forthe environment.
Social DimensionThe social impact is influenced by other
impacts, in both positive and negative ways.However, most of the researchers believe thatnanotechnology will be able to improve thequality of life among the population and that
it might lead to further extension of the humanlife span (respectively, m = 3.58 and m = 3.13).But they disagree that, currently, nanotech-nology has a negative image among the popu-lation (m = 1.69) and that it may cause harmto human health (m = 2.02).
The expectation that nanotechnology willbring benefits to the population is, thus, gene-rally confirmed. The interviewed researchersseem to expect a great deal from the nano-technological revolution, reflecting the trans-forming role of the scientific discoveries in thesociety (see Table 4).
Implications for the Regulatory FrameworkThe interviewed researchers agree (m = 3.37)
that the laws and rules should help preventany potential negative impact from nanotech-nology. However, they are not fully in accor-dance that the standards of ethical conduct ofresearchers should be stricter with nanotech-nology (m = 2.54 and s = 1.00). This may indi-cate a certain fear within the academic com-munity regarding the risks of misusing theexpected potential of nanotechnology (seeTable 5). This is, perhaps, better explained ifone considers the fact that they are also doubt-ful over the standardization of laboratory pro-cedures and health care researchers should bestricter with nanotechnology (m = 2.66 and s
= 0.95). However, respondents agree withtightening control of the manipulation ofnanotechnology by lab workers in order to pre-vent health risks. This shows some concernabout the possibility of contamination bynanotechnology, with a similar proportionwho agree that nanotechnology could pollu-te the biological chain and cause harm tohuman health.
Here, once again, the standard deviation ishigh, reinforcing the perception of uncertain-ty.
Impact on the StakeholdersIn the course of introducing a new techno-
economic paradigm several stakeholders influ-ence and are influenced by the technologicalinnovation process.
Questioned as to whether nanotechnologywill negatively impact the stakeholders, thesurveyed researchers strongly disagree (m =1.12 and s = 0.37) that this could happen to thescientific community, industry and compa-nies, consumers, the population, governments,and NGOs (see Table 6).
Moreover, in almost all the statementsregarding the impacts on the stakeholders thestandard-deviation tends to be low, which sug-gests the scientific community has a positiveconcept of nanotechnology.
Table 4 Social Dimension
ImpactsMean (m)from 1 to 4
StandardDeviation (s)
May improve the population’s quality of life. 3.58 0.56
Nowadays, nanotechnology has a negative image among the population. 1.69 0.89
May extend the human life span. 3.13 0.69
May cause damage to human health. 2.02 0.68
ImpactsMean (m)from 1 to 4
StandardDeviation (s)
Laws and rules should prevent any potential negative impact from nanotechnology. 3.37 0.85
Regulation may restrain private investment in nanotechnology. 2.43 0.91
The ethical principles governing researchers should be stricter with nanotechnology. 2.54 1.00
The laboratory procedures and health care standards for researchers should bestricter with nanotechnology.
2.66 0.95
Table 5 Implications for the Regulatory Framework
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Yet the highest standard deviation (s=0.77)is related to the impacts of nanotechnologyon non-governmental organizations (NGOs),which may reflect a certain fear on the partof the scientific communities related to theactions of more critical NGOs that emphasi-zed the negative aspects of Genetically Modi-fied Food technology.
While R&D expenditures on nanotechno-logy is steadily growing in developed coun-tries, in Brazil, the number of companies thathave initiated a nanotechnological trajectoryis still very low. In our research, only five repre-sentatives of such companies were intervie-wed. Even with the small sample of the repre-sentatives from the business world, the impactof nanotechnology outlined in the interviewscorresponds with the expectations identifiedby the experts interviewed in the previousstep in this study.
Technological impactsThe technological impacts of nanotechno-
logy are (and will) be significant in severalindustrial sectors, particularly in the pharma-ceutical industry, as shown by the four res-pondents from this sector.
Nanotechnology is expected to reduce therisks involved in product development to helpchange the paradigm within the pharmaceu-tical industry from a process of trial and errorto one which is planned, and focused on spe-cific uses of the new active ingredient. In thisindustry, nanotechnology research is motivat-ed by the special features it appears to offer.On-going research can be divided into twotypes: the scientific and technological.
The scientific search for new compounds,whether synthetic, vegetable or animal, cangenerate new drugs. Despite the tremendousadvances in biotechnology, the fine chemicalsindustry still employs the traditional synthe-sis of substances technique. Nanotechnologyoffers the opportunity to synthesize the mole-cules from which substances are made.
The technological research involves thesearch for new forms of administration andabsorption, and longer lasting action of thedrug in the body and seeking ways to enhan-ce and restrict the action of the drug at anexact point in the body in order to increasethe chances of effective action and reduce sideeffects. The first discoveries involving the appli-cation of nanotechnology are taking place wit-hin technological research.
In this section, applications are brokendown into the categories of drug action con-trol process, the extent of treatment by syn-thetic drugs, enhancement of active healingand disinfecting systems, the scope and effecti-veness of external (equipment and techniques)and internal (in vivo) diagnosis, new synthe-sis production processes, new techniques forcontrolling the dimension of the productionprocess, among others.
The Brazilian cosmetics industry has onlytwo companies capable of designing nano-technology-based products. A representativeof one of these companies asserted thatresearch into nanotechnology offers a num-ber of technological benefits such as increa-sed productivity during the release of the acti-ve cosmetics on human skin, increasing theeffectiveness of the cosmetic effect on the sur-face of human epidermis, slowing the agingof human epidermis, increasing the efficien-cy and effectiveness of the cosmetic action of
Will negatively impact on the scientific community. 1.12 0.37
Will negatively impact on industry and companies. 1.26 0.57
Will negatively impact on the population. 1.19 0.40
Will negatively impact on consumers. 1.19 0.40
Will have more negative than positive impacts on governments. 1.20 0.40
Will negatively impact on non-governmental organizations 1.50 0.77
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sunscreen achieved by the combination offunctional properties in the cosmetic product(in addition to maintaining the quality of theskin, the cosmetic can change the colour itselfin accordance with changes in indicators ofthe environment such as temperature), amongother impacts.
In addition to the impacts on specific tech-nological industries, impacts of greater mag-nitude were indirectly mentioned, such as unli-mited solutions, technology integration, newprocedures, creation of new materials and cut-ting the time required for product develop-ment.
Economic ImpactsFor both industries, respondents foresee
that nanotechnology will save the active ingre-dient per unit of output, enable faster deve-lopment of new and efficient products, crea-te jobs for highly qualified professionals (PhDsand researchers), increase competition bet-ween companies in different sectors, requirehigher levels of initial investment for R & D,permit the development of more productiveprocesses, among other impacts.
Social and Environmental Impacts2
The reasons given by the interviewees forthis were: ignorance of the matter, difficultyanticipating uncertain events (since at thetime of the interviews, all the potential pro-ducts were in the early or intermediate stagesof development), and fear that an opinionmight impede the path of some innovationstrategies.
Unlike the experts, the company represen-tatives do not have clear opinions aboutimpacts on social and environmental dimen-sions. In general, the consideration of environ-mental and social concerns in the develop-ment of new technologies is relatively new inBrazilian companies, which means that theydo not create adequate condition for furthernanotechnological innovation.
Regarding this issue, the most plausibleconclusion is that the initial investment innanotechnology, as estimated by these com-panies, may be significantly increased by theignoring/exclusion of the social and environ-mental impacts. Business decisions are increa-
singly influenced by other types of stakehol-ders (such as unions, NGOs, etc.) in technolo-gically innovative projects, in addition to tra-ditional stakeholders (employees, customers,suppliers and government). This tends to leadto a lack of a close quality control during theprocess of developing a new technology or pro-duct.
Discussion: Towards a New Regulato-ry Framework
The present study examined the technolo-gical, economic, environmental and socialdimensions of nanotechnology. In order to per-ceive the different interlinked effects and rela-tions, a three-fold study was conduced withindifferent communities. Experts representingdifferent social stakeholders, nanobiotechresearchers and some businessmen were con-sulted in an attempt to shed light on uncer-tainty surrounding the possible impacts ofnanotechnology.
It is our belief that the different insightsindicate the possibilities that nanotechnolo-gy may provide. The experts seem to be morecautious regarding which impacts are positi-ve and which are negative. Although theresearchers are much more optimistic, it seemsthat their views are based much more on“wishful thinking” than on conviction. Theresearchers, being directly involved in newscientific and technological discovery, natu-rally stress the theoretical benefits of any upco-ming technology. Finally, the businessmen aremuch more concerned with the short term rat-her than the long term results.3
However, they all seem to agree with someconclusions. Nanotechnology will certainlylead to the growth of new industrial sectors,requiring increased spending in R&D and newprofessional skills. Moreover, the new drugs,new treatments and new materials resultingfrom the nanotechnological revolution willchange quality of life for mankind. New pro-ducts seem to offer a whole new range of valueperception and profitability.
Negative impacts were also commonly per-ceived, especially in terms of the impacts onhuman health and the growth in unemploy-ment. These two drivers fall within the soci-
2) These impacts were included together in this section because none of the respondents identified any positive or negative social or environmental impacts arising from nano-technology.
3) It is noteworthy that the type of field research influences the results. It is our belief that, an important limitation of this study was the use of different investigative methodsfor each community. And, thus, two limitations emerged: the researchers were too optimistic about the application of nanotechnology; and five company representatives is toosmall a sample to draw generalizations and consistent comparisons. However, even with these limitations, the results show that the impacts identified in the field study are inline with observations made in the literature in relation to nanotechnology.
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al dimension, since they affect public expen-diture on maintaining health and social secu-rity systems.
Like any other new technology, it is abso-lutely necessary to have a regulatory frame-work that ensures the control of any possibleharmful impacts. This new framework shouldconsider the commitment of different stake-holders, and the use of and the results fromnanotechnology R&D.
Considering the possible impacts listed forNanotechnology, one can say that universi-ties, in particular, as well as companies andtechnological centres demonstrate a "commit-ment" to the new emerging techno-economicparadigm.
There are some significant points thatshould guide the development of applicationsand products that relay on nanotechnology,such as: (a) the benefits of nanotechnologymust outweigh the highlighted risks in orderto reach a wide range of people, both in termsof its use and advantages; and (b) regulationshould not overstate the severity of risk, inorder not to inhibit investments in the R&Dof nanotechnological applications, such as wasseen in the case of stem-cell research debate.
A new mode of regulation must, above all,safeguard the rights of consumers and indi-vidual citizens. With nanotechnology it shouldnot be different, so that appropriate methodsof testing the reliability and safety of productsin terms of their effects on human and envi-ronmental health need to be developed andintroduced. Any product that incorporatesnanotechnology should be identified as suchand if the advantages, for example, reliabili-ty and safety, of such a product are alreadyestablished they should have preference (e.g.government may subsidize their R&D and pro-duction) over products devoid of such techno-logy.
Any regulatory framework should be builtwithin the context of a debate involving allthe stakeholders, informed by the technicalopinion of scientists, where relations are basedon mutual trust and communication is clearand open. All new products should be asses-sed, considering factors such as the potentialrisks, interactions with other particles or sub-stances and toxicity, among others. The prio-rity is to evaluate new materials, determinetheir risk levels and add basic information toestablish the regulatory clauses.
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