Risk Communication for Nanobiotechnology: To Whom,about What,and Why?

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It is not the purpose of this paper to argue that scientific analyses are necessarily superior to (e.g., more accurate than) culture-based predilections or aversions; however, the two often support contradictory conclusions.

“Nanobio refers to nano-products and nano-processes that use biological materials, that are intended to affect biological processes, or that mimic biological systems.” Paradise J. , “Comparative Report – Developing U.S. Oversight Strategies for Nanobiotechnology: Learning from Past Oversight Experiences,” Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics 37, no. 4 (2009): 688–705.

See also H. Gans's well-known 1979 analysis of how things become news, in Hans G. , Deciding What's News: A Study of CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, Newsweek and Time (New York: Pantheon Books, 1979).

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Of course, expert knowledge cannot ever be completely “unbiased” and some element of coercion may be unavoidable.

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Based on the consumer products inventory of the Woodrow Wilson Center's Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies, available at <http://www.nanotechproject.org/inventories/consumer/> (last visited June 3, 2009).

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Paradise J. , “Evaluating Oversight of Human Drugs and Medical Devices: A Case Study of the FDA and Implications for Nanobiotechnology,” Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics 37, no. 4 (2009): 598–624.

See Quist D. Chapela I. H. , “Transgenic DNA Introgressed into Traditional Maize Landraces in Oaxaca, Mexico,” Nature 414, no. 6863 (2001): 541–543. This claim was, however, broadly disputed.

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