Some 250 nanotechnology products developed by Iranian researchers and scientists will hit the domestic market in the current local calendar year (to end on March 20, 2020), Head of Iran’s Nanotechnology Initiative Council (INIC) Saeed Sarkar announced on Tuesday.
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Sarkar said 180 produced related to nanotechnology were developed and introduced to the Iranian market last year. He added that there are currently as many as 580 homegrown nanotechnology products in the domestic market.
Sarkar stressed the INIC’s plans to increase the number of Iranian nano products this year, saying the Council intends to develop and distribute 250 nanotechnology-related items to the market in 2019.
According to him, Iran’s expertise on nanotechnology has reached to over 15 industrial sectors.
Iranian nanotechnology products have been exported to over 45 countries, he said, naming some of these countries as South Korea, Australia, China, Indonesia, Russia, Turkey, Malaysia, Canada, as well countries in Europe, Latin America, and Africa.
Last year, Iran’s revenues from nano exports stood at $62 million, the INIC head said, adding that the Council has plans to increase the value of its exports this year.
It was announced in mid-February that Iranian scientific centers and technology firms had registered 68% more patents at European and American patent offices in 2018, compared with the year before.
There has been a significant growth in the number of registered patents by Iran in the nanotechnology area, Iran Nanotechnology Innovation Council (INIC) reports, according to the Statnano portal.
13,050 patents were registered in the Europe (EPTO) and US (USPTO) patent offices in 2018. The number of registered patents in 2018 is 68% higher than in 2017. This number puts Iran in the 21st place in the global ranking of countries with most nanotechnology patents.
Iran is followed by Luxembourg, Denmark, Turkey, and Austria in the global ranking.
Early in January, it was announced that a team of Iranian scientists and researchers from Shiraz University managed to design and produce a biosensor to diagnose urinary infections, using nanotechnology and a sum of 16 nanoparticles of gold and silver.
Shiraz University researchers succeeded in designing and producing a sensor for diagnosing urinary infections by using nanotechnology.
“A sum of 16 nanoparticles of gold and silver were used in the design of this sensor, and the interaction of vapors from bacteria in the urine sample with nanoparticles caused a change in the color in the sensor so that the nanoparticles of gold changes from red to violet and silver nanoparticles from yellow to brown,” supervisor of Shiraz university research team Bahram Hemmatinejad said.
Hemmatinejad added that since the vapors of each bacterium differs from other bacteria, the change in the color of the nanoparticles will determine the type of bacteria and the intensity of the color change and the concentration of the infection.
“The current method for diagnosis of urinary infection is a culture of urine specimens, which its results are determined in 48 hours, but with the help of this sensor, this time is reduced to half an hour,” the chemistry professor at Shiraz University continued.
Iran has made huge progress in different sciences and technologies in recent years.
Iranian Vice-President for Science and Technology Sorena Sattari announced early in December that Iran stood atop the nations of the region in the production of science and technology.
"Now, Iran ranks first in the region in science and technology," Sattari said, addressing a forum on stem cells in Tehran.
He also referred to Iran's huge progress in the field of stem cells, and said that the country had been able to take over Turkey and Israel in this field.
Sattari underscored that Iran's progress in the field of stem cells and regenerative medicine had opened a door to the development of knowledge-based economy.
Also, in June, Sattari underlined that Iran's international ranking in science production had risen from 34th to 16th.
"Iran ranks first in West Asia in terms of science output with the number of its college students rising to 4.8 million from 2.4 million," Sattari said, addressing the second Iran-Europe Cooperation Conference in Brussels, Belgium.
He reiterated that Iran had made great progress in the fields of biotechnology, renewable energy, nanotechnology and stem cells.
Sattari said that there were 47 million internet users in Iran who constitute nearly half of the total Internet users in the Middle East, and added, "Iran ranks first in the Middle East for production of biological drugs."
He said that Iran had one of the most successful biotech companies with young and skilled staff aged 33 on the average which exported biological drugs to 10 countries, Sattari said.
Of 39 technology parks existing in Iran, Paris Park is one of the largest in West Asia which houses 200 companies and some of them export advanced technological products, he added.
