Conference: 2025 Environmental Nanotechnology GRC

This NSF award supports the 2025 Environmental Nanotechnology Gordon Research Conference that will be held in Newry, Maine June 1-6,2025. This conference will explore current, unpublished, state-of-the art research on the applications of nanotechnology for 1) water and food production, 2) energy development; and 3) protection of human and environmental health. Opportunity exists to create novel materials based on the enhanced catalytic, optical, magnetic and electrical properties of nanomaterials across a variety of sectors from human health to water purification, remediation, sensing, energy production, and security. Challenging and rewarding work must be done to seize this opportunity while designing nanotechnology with the environment in mind. The conference attendees will include environmental engineers, environmental scientists, chemists, policymakers, and other stakeholders. Attendees will exchange ideas and promote the development of new convergent research concepts focused on the environmental applications of nanotechnology. Formal and informal discussions facilitated by attendance at this conference will promote further development of the environmental nanotechnology field. Face-to-face interactions between conference attendees will facilitate transdisciplinary research activities. NSF funding will enable the conference organizer to provide travel grants to invited speakers, post-doctoral scholars, graduate students, and junior faculty. The specific objectives of the conference are to 1) provide a forum for generations of ideas regarding the use of nanotechnology to benefit the environment and society through technology development, and 2) to generate ideas and research programs that will foment prevention of potential environmental harms that may result from indiscriminate development and use of nanotechnology. These objectives will be addressed in technical sessions, via submitted posters, and through collaborative activities. This award will enable the conference organizer to provide travel grants to invited speakers, post-doctoral scholars, graduate students, and junior faculty. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.