report
9.8.6 Application and perspectives

The expert engagement process resulted in the following perspectives for the technology segment:

• Funding research for the ‘Incident Support' Sub-sector was considered more important for societal reasons than for the economy.

• The main drivers for research and development in ‘Incident Support' were considered to be technological and social impact resulting from the technology. This was followed by ethical, environment, health and safety drivers. The technological drivers are cost, performance, efficiency and absence of technological solution.

• The main drivers for research and development in ‘Decontamination' post incident was mentioned as decontamination effect on civilian zones and water supply, inexpensive approach to response, impact of response and time taken for response to take effect.

• Main barriers for research and development for ‘Incident Support' were identified as availability of finance to early stage companies and intellectual property conflicts. Secondary barriers mentioned were access to equipment and infrastructure, inadequate technology transfer, and lack of supportive governmental policy.

• The main barriers for research and development for ‘Decontamination' segment were identified as inadequate research funding, inadequate availability of skilled personnel, robustness of field trials, health effect of nanoparticles, and availability of countermeasures.

• The most important functional requirements were mentioned as ‘time taken for desorption', and ‘high decontamination efficiency'. Other secondary functionality were mentioned as ‘biocompatability', ‘high uptake of toxin', ‘destructive desorption' and ‘functionality retention for filter applications'.

• Nanoscaled metal oxides, nanocrystalline zeolites, photo-catalytic titanium dioxide, fibrous membranes, nanoceramic membranes, nanoscale coatings on filters are expected to be in the market in the next 5 years. Optimization of nanostructures and combination with other materials are factors that would determine the market uptake. For nanoscale coatings, durability of coatings and optimization of retained pore size would be the important factors for technological uptake.

• Nanoprous keratin fibres and nanoporous mechanical membranes are expected to take up to 10 years. For mechanical membranes, factors such as avoidance of clogging, compromise between activity and longevity would be important.

• Nanoscaled metal oxides, photo catalytic titanium dioxide, xerogels were considered to be nanomaterials with very attractive and relatively higher growth future markets for products.

• Nanocrytalline zeolites, nanoporus keratin fibres, nanomaterials for membranes and coatings were considered moderately attractive growth market for future products.

• North American research, development and commercialisation efforts were considered better than Europe which was considered better than Asia for the technology segment.

• Potential toxicity of nanoparticles was mentioned as a concern with suitable development of appropriate precautionary measures underlined.