The potential of nano-technologies raises great hopes. Far-reaching claims are made by both opponents and proponents. The first difficulty in describing the state of the art accurately is to distinguish between science and science fiction, i.e. between the state of the art today, what may be around the corner tomorrow and what remains highly speculative. The ethical issues raised at these stages are not necessarily the same. Today's nanotechnologies exploit the interaction of three technological developments: 1. New and improved control of the size and manipulation of nano-scale building blocks and standardisation of nanodevices; 2. New and improved characterisation of materials on a nano scale; 3. New and improved understanding of the relationships between nanostructure and properties and how these can be engineered.
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