PITTCON maybe be becoming more of a “microscopy” meeting. Of the four main special “symposia” of this years PITTCON, two had the following titles: a) Nanoscale Self-Assembled Systems and b) Nanobiotechnology: From the Single Cell to the Single Molecule, suggesting that nanotechnology is becoming an important part of PITTCON programming and PITTCON sessions. This point was also consistent with the demographics of those visiting the SPI Supplies exhibit booth.

One visitor who was from the local Chicago area, and who was attending his first PITTCON, and who considered himself a “life science person”, asked me an intriguing question: Where can I go to take a short course in “Materials Science for the Life Scientist”. It seemed to me like he was inspired by the work presented in the Plenary Lecture which was the topic of my last posting. I did not have any suggestions for him. If there are such courses available, please make it known.

Also I am equally sure there must be a demand for “Life Science for the Materials Scientist” for similar reasons.

Other observations: PITTCON exhibitions of five or six years ago had large exhibit booths from “electronic” website firms like SciQuest.com and Chemdex.com, just to name two. This year’s PITTCON did not seem to have hardly any such firms, perhaps because as most have found out, it is easier and more rewarding to turn to Google and find what you need that way. And with a Google search, one gets an unfiltered kind of report, not just one that shows firms agreeing to pay (to be on the list).

Trade journal booths seem to be getting smaller and this seems to be because, well, lets face it, we are all reading less and less of what comes in the mail and more and more electronically via what comes over our computer screens. Smaller readerships mean smaller numbers of paid advertisers. Indeed to the extent I had time to meet with other exhibitors, including publishers, it seems that those in the publishing business are trying hard to figure out how to change their business models so that they can make money off their internet websites (and to make up for lost advertising revenues from their print publications). My own sense is that there is great frustration in many of the large publishing houses as they try to transition from a purely print operation to one that also has an electronic component. It turns out that many publishing firms are finding it hard to get their new internet audiences to pay for what up until now has been available for free.

MicroChuck

The PITTCON 2007 is now history. The organizers were not publicizing the attendance figures as they usually have done, hence I have concluded, based on that and also, traffic in the exhibition to mean attendance was “down” from last year. Certainly there seemed to be more than the normal number of “empty” booths, suggesting last minute cancellations.

But on Sunday, I had the opportunity to attend the Opening Session which included a Plenary Lecture by Dr. Charles M. Lieber, The Mark Hyman Jr. Professor of Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and Professor in the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University. The title of his talk was “Nanowire Nanoelectronic Devices for Detection of and Interfacing to Biological Systems”.

Now this is superb research and anyone having a chance to hear Prof. Lieber will not quickly forget his presentation and what they learn.

But there is something else that came across to me: Prof. Lieber and his group are working at the forefront of research on nanowires and nanotubes, and their work involves intimate knowledge of biological interactions at the nanoscale, and in addition, work at the cutting edge of biological research and chemical sensing. Naturally, SEM
and TEM were critically needed tools to study and characterize the structures they were fabricating. And it looked like they were using some MEMS methodologies to produce some of their sensor structures. But what struck me as being the most amazing is how so many of the traditional barriers that define materials science, biological science, chemistry, physics, and perhaps are few other disciplines have so quickly disappeared. The point is, I don’t know how one would classify the work being done by Prof. Lieber and his group in traditional terms.

This also suggests that those scientists having the greatest potential for profound discoveries in the future will be those who know as much about materials science as they do about life science and vice versa. Perhaps the way of the future will not be along the lines of classical chemistry, physics, biology, etc. departments but structured more along the lines of multidisciplinary departments. If I am right about this, then this surely does suggest that any life science researcher, to stay ahead of their peers, will need to become an expert in materials science and vice versa.

I can’t help but think about the time of my own graduate days when I viewed myself as being in materials science and computer science was like another world. In those days and in my world, there were materials science people and there were computer science people. Had I been able to predict the merging of these fields, that one day one could not do cutting edge materials science and without having a good computer science background, perhaps some of my earlier choices in course electives might have been different.

I think the merging of disciplines is already happening at breakneck speed, and those wanting to stay at the forefront of their respective fields will have to learn the other technologies they don’t already know.

MicroChuck