NanoSci-ERA

Basic Information

Description

NanoSci-ERA is a Consortium of 13 national organizations, each running a program of support for its national research community in Nano-science. The Partner programs cover a large majority of Nano-science research in Europe and a significant fraction of the field worldwide. Two Associate organizations will also follow the work.

Nano-science is an emerging but strategic interdisciplinary scientific domain focusing on the exploration of the physical laws of the nano-scale. It opens new vistas in science and provides novel concepts to trigger breakthroughs in Nanotechnology, expected to have a strong impact on the economy of the 21st-century.

The focus of NanoSci-ERA is basic research, and its principal objective is the increased collaboration and integration of the national Nano-science research communities in Europe through transnational research projects and evaluation. This objective is served by three operational objectives, namely the effective and durable coordination of the Partner agencies, the development of a coherent scientific policy on the multidisciplinary development of Nano-science throughout the ERA, and the concerted outreach to the societal players.

The attainment of these objectives is structured into 5 Work-Packages: One Work-Package for each of the three operational objectives (WP1, WP4, and WP5), and two Work-Packages on the principal objective, one focusing on promotion of transnational research (WP2), while the other concentrates on joint accompanying measures (WP3).

All four objectives, and the five Work-Packages leading to them, aim at overcoming the fragmentation of Nano-science research along national lines and thus create synergy to amplify the action of the national agencies, to contribute decisively to the development of a concerted scientific policy throughout the ERA, and to fulfil the needs and reinforce the strengths of the European Nano-science research community, so that it can be at the leading edge of world competition.