It's a good thing that, as Richard Feynman said, there's plenty of room at the bottom, because it's getting crowded down there. Scientists with something to say about nanotech don't lack for venues to publish in, as more and more are cropping up all the time. Some are academically rigorous, some have a more populist tone, some are purely online affairs, and some are only available in paper.

But traditional academic hard-copy journals require a peer review, publishing and printing process which can mean a lag of months or years between a research project and the publication of its results. In nanotechnology, that delay can be lethal as the pace of research and development accelerates daily. To avoid publishing stale material, academic journals in nanotechnology, like their more generalist counterparts, have gone online. Here are links to a few:

Nanotechnology, published since 1990 by the Institute of Physics, aims to publish papers at the forefront of nanoscale science and technology and especially those of an interdisciplinary nature. Here, nanotechnology is taken to include the ability to individually address, control, and modify structures, materials and devices with nanometre precision, and the synthesis of such structures into systems of micro- and macroscopic dimensions such as MEMS based devices.

Nano Letters, published by the American Chemical Society, describes itself as the leading forum for rapid communication of nanoscale research in a range of disciplines. It reports on fundamental research in all branches of the theory and practice of nanoscience and nanotechnology, providing rapid disclosure of the key elements of a study, publishing preliminary, experimental, and theoretical results on the physical, chemical, and biological phenomena, along with processes and applications of structures within the nanoscale range.

Science, published by the American Association for the advancement of Science, promotes itself as the world's leading journal of original scientific research, global news, and commentary. It is a weekly, peer-reviewed journal that publishes significant original scientific research, plus reviews and analyses of current research and science policy.

Nature is a weekly international journal publishing, according to its publisher, the finest peer-reviewed research in all fields of science and technology on the basis of its originality, importance, interdisciplinary interest, timeliness, accessibility, elegance and surprising conclusions. Nature also provides rapid, authoritative, insightful and arresting news and interpretation of topical and coming trends affecting science, scientists and the wider public.

Virtual Journal of Nanoscale Science & Technology is a weekly virtual journal containing articles that have appeared in one of several participating source journals and that fall within a number of contemporary topical areas in the science and technology of nanometer-scale structures. The articles are primarily those that have been published in the previous week; however, at the discretion of the editors older articles may also appear, particularly review articles. Links to other useful Web resources on nanoscale systems are also provided.

Journal for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology is an international and multidisciplinary peer-reviewed journal with a wide-ranging coverage, consolidating research activities in all areas of nanoscience and nanotechnology into a single and unique reference source. JNN is the first cross-disciplinary journal to publish original full research articles, rapid communications of important new scientific and technological findings, timely state-of-the-art reviews with author's photo and short biography, and current research news encompassing the fundamental and applied research in all disciplines of science, engineering and medicine.

Journal of Nanoparticle Research from Springer Science+Business Media bills itself as the first interdisciplinary journal devoted to Nanoparticle science and technology. The focus of the Journal is on the specific concepts, properties, phenomena, and processes related to particles, tubes, layers, macromolecules, clusters and other finite structures of the nanoscale size range.

International Journal of Nanoscience from World Scientific Publishing is an inter-disciplinary, internationally-reviewed research journal covering all aspects of nanometer scale science and technology. Articles in any contemporary topical areas are sought, from basic science of nanoscale physics and chemistry to applications in nanodevices, quantum engineering and quantum computing.

IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology covers the physical basis and engineering applications of phenomena at the nanoscale level across all areas of science and engineering.

News from the Bottom, which I introduced in an earlier post, is the first student journal of nanotechnology.

Nanotechnology and Perception is the new kid on the block, with its second volume due out later this year. But you can listen to a podcast with Editor-in-Chief Dr. Jeremy Rasden courtesy of Science and Society.

Also, check out Richard Jones' Soft Machines for a review of several nanotech journals.