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Familiarity with the fields of nanotechnology and nanomedicine is a pre-requisite for this specification.  An understanding of ISA-TAB is recommended but not required as the nano-TAB specification provides descriptive information on ISA-TAB as applied to nanotechnology.

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1. nano-TAB Introduction

1.1       Rationale

Nanobioinformatics has been largely recognized as an essential element of our nation’s competitiveness in nanotechnology and a rational approach to employ weight-of-the-evidence strategies that ensure its safe development according to the National Nanotechnology Initiative, 2006. The ability to manipulate matter at the atomic scale will enable a broad range of beneficial applications in the electronics, healthcare (e.g. nanomedicine, imaging, and diagnostics), cosmetics, technologies and engineering industries.  Pertinent to the development of promising biomedical nanotechnologies and to the safety of nanoscale materials in general, is a thorough understanding of nanomaterial-biological interactions.  However, a rational approach must be employed early on in nanotechnology evolution to direct the safe development of novel nanotechnologies and provide accurate predictions of nanomaterial-biological interactions based on weight-of-the-evidence (Dahl et al., 2007; McKenzie and Hutchison, 2004). This inevitably will require data mining and computer simulation for visualization of the important parameters in an almost infinite set of data from global research efforts in nanoscience and nanotechnology (Teeguarden et al., 2007).  To date, the lack of standardization has been one of the most significant barriers to data sharing. 

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