Q: Would you agree with the statement ‘Egypt is not yet ready’ for nanotechnology?
Abdel-Mottaleb: This is a statement used by people who are simply trying to maintain the status quo; it is absolutely baseless and has no foundation whatsoever. Actually, if anything, nanotechnology is one of the best options for Egypt to move forward, whether it is on a scientific basis or economical basis.

Nanotechnology’s research cost might be a little bit expensive in certain areas but the beauty of it is that you don’t need to have the expensive equipment in every single lab; it can be made available in centralized locations where you have access to them or [...] to other groups who do not own them. This is actually one of the problems in the Egyptian approach to nanotechnology: I was personally involved in starting up three nanotechnology research labs, none of which really looked at the utilization of the equipment. They were budgeting equipment worth millions of dollars, the utilization of which is only 10% — that’s a waste of resources.

Q: Ahmed Zewail, the Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry, has said that ‘research and development is not a luxury, as some believe, reserved for the rich or developed countries.’ Would you agree?
Abdel-Mottaleb: Certainly, this is absolutely true and if you look at any country that actually developed in the past 50 years, its technology was the basis of such development, and investing in research and development (R&D) is at its core. One just has to be careful not to invest in everything in R&D and to really focus otherwise they’re wasting money. We really need to build on what we have, not claim that nothing that exists here in Egypt and build everything from scratch — that is a waste of energy and time. Again, we really need to build on what we have.

Now in terms of potential benefits to Egyptian citizens, I don’t believe that there is any technology in the world that can prove to society the importance of R&D and science as quickly as nanotechnology. […] Look at an issue as simple as health care — and I’m not even going to talk about drugs, I’m just going to talk about hygiene. [The] Egyptian health care system suffers tremendously from [poor] hygiene in hospitals.

There are solutions in nanotechnology that maintain a very high level of hygiene through applying specific types of paint that would kill bacteria, so if the cleaning staff doesn’t do their job correctly, the paint will cover for that. Now this is a very simple and cheap application. If you deploy such an application, you’ve solved the problem. [...] There are very cheap solutions.

On another note, Egypt suffers from electricity outages and blackouts in the summer. The reason is the overload from air conditioners used to combat the really high temperature of Egypt’s summer.

The problem is the temperature is so high outside and our homes are not insulated properly to combat the heat. In Europe and the US and many other parts of the world, homes are insulated properly from the building phase.

We don’t have the [capacity] to do that and right now with all these houses that are not properly insulated. If you use traditional technology, the only solution would be to demolish these houses, re-build them and install proper insulation from the beginning. The air conditioners keep trying to cool [the houses] down while the heat keeps coming in through the walls so the air conditioning units have to work more and more […]. If you insulate that incoming heat, you’ve solved the problem — your air conditioners don’t have to work that hard to cool the room down.

Now nanotechnology provides commercial applications that do exist in the market; a paint that would insulate the house from at least 10% of the heat coming in. It has been proven that [in] using this technology, you cut your electricity consumption down by 50%.

Who on earth would dare to say that we cannot benefit from this or we should not get into this […]? We should, and that’s why we started the nanotechnology master’s program at Nile University [in 2010]. We are strong believers that this technology can really [solve] a lot of the problems we’re facing in Egypt.

Q: Can you comment about the applications of nanotechnology?
Abdel-Mottaleb: Yes, that is something we’re working on and that is something the entire world is working on. You have to understand that the essence of nanotechnology is simply manipulating materials. We are not inventing new materials — it’s old materials [of which] we are discovering new properties […] and thus we discover new ways of using them.

Most nanotechnology applications, [...] or the core of the applications, are seeing solutions developed in different sectors and taking these solutions and applying it in another sector.

I’ll give you an example that may clarify [this] a little bit. The materials used in producing the paint that kills bacteria are widely available worldwide and actually Egypt is very rich in them.

It’s not a drug, but it kills bacteria by breaking down its cell membranes — they cannot survive. It has been discovered that these same materials, if used on windshields for example, can prevent your windshield from fogging up.

Also, the oil and gas industry has a huge problem in their drilling equipment because there are bacteria that grow in and around the oil wells that produce sulfur gas which really damages the metals [of their drilling equipment]. For quite a long time, the oil and gas industry’s solution to this problem had been to cover the metal parts used for drilling in chrome. The problem with that is these parts become severely worn during drilling and the moment the chrome cover gets scratched, [it becomes useless].

If I remember correctly, we were at one of the very first nanotechnology workshops for the oil and gas industry in 2008 where this problem was being discussed. All [the] nanotechnologists didn’t even think about it when [industry experts] spoke about [this problem] because it’s so obvious to us.

To us, they were looking at the problem in the wrong way: Why are they trying to protect the metal, when they could just kill the bacteria instead? It’s a lot easier. […] The material […] to kill the bacteria is the same material used for the paint that is used in health care facilities for the same purpose. We discovered that health care has been using this technology for quite a while […] to disinfect wounds.
So [nanotechnology] really is multi-disciplinary in that you’re looking at applications for one thing, you modify it completely to fit something else, but in the end it’s the same material.

You’ll find that the applications of nanotechnology are really wide and the idea to develop the methodology is very important. How do you approach the problem? And that’s what keeps nanotechnology unique. But in the end, it’s just fundamental chemistry and fundamental physics that you’re using to develop this technology. bt

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Q: Would you agree with the statement ‘Egypt is not yet ready’ for nanotechnology? Abdel-Mottaleb: