It was a busy day for nanotech under the Capitol dome in Washington DC today as the NanoBusiness Alliance kicked off two days of meetings with top government officials and the president of Altair Nanotechnologies (Altairnano) spoke before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.

"What we need is an initiative," Altairnano CEO and president Alan J. Gotcher told the committee, "similar in scope to the Human Genome project, with the goal of establishing broad empirical data and models for the predictability of the environmental, health and safety risks of commercially-interesting nanomaterials."

Gotcher called on Congress to provide increased federal funding for nanotechnology and explained nanotech benefits like chemical/biological sensors that can detect and display information about life-threatening biohazards.

Altairnano is working with the universities of Western Michigan and Nevada-Reno to develop arrays capable of detecting a wide spectrum of potential explosives, chemical/biological weapons and illegal drugs.