There have been several events aiming to build a bridge between the World of Art, Science and Public in the area of Nanotechnologies during the conference. First of all, the accompanying program was set up to, as well as other things, mediate the latest high technologies that are produced by the current science in the area of nanotechnologies to the public – using artistic devices. The project was aimed to mirror the scientific field through the unlimited visual language of art and also, shall we say in a rather subtle way – vice versa. To reach these goals, the accompanying program was to step out of the Prague Congress centre, with a couple of events.

nanoTruck - High-Tech from the Nanocosmos
Nanotechnologies are an emerging area of research and industrial activity. As a part of the conference accompanying program and to communicate the nanotechnologies to public there was the nanoTruck exhibition (www.nanotruck.de) themed "nanoTruck – High-Tech from the Nanocosmos” invited to Prague and hosted by the Czech Technical University Prague – Faculty of civil engineering with kind support of the Dean prof. Zdenek Bittnar (member of the NAB ENF2009). nanoTruck welcomed allmost 3000 visitors during the three days of its presence in Prague. It gave the unique opportunity to 21 high-school groups and university students as well as the public to get in touch directly with nano -technologies, -materials and related products. High number of students from the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Czech Technical University Prague as well as from other universities: Chemical Institute Prague, University of Life Sciences Prague and Brno University of Technology were present.

With its 60 exhibits the nanoTruck exhibition demonstrated the diverse spectrum of nanotechnology applications as well as their potential for future. Most interest was given to the Bucky-Ball, the alfa omega of research falling under the nanotechnology umbrella, and the scanning tunneling microscope, a powerful technique for viewing surfaces at the atomic level.

nanoTruck – High-Tech from the Nanocosmos - opening
From left: Petr Štěpánek - Member of the Prague City Council, Karel Klusáček - Director of the Technology Centre ASCR, Ladislav Musílek - Vice-Rector for Science and Research, CTU, Markus Döring, Flad&Flad Communication Group

Bucky-Ball, the three-dimensional folder leads to a model nanostructure.
Discovery of this structure called “Buckminster Fulleren“ was awarded by the Nobel Prize in 1996. It is named after English architect Charles Buckminster Fuller with nickname “Bucky-Ball“. Bucky-Ball consists of 60 carbon atoms organized in pentagons and hexagons. Bucky-Ball may contains various number of carbon atoms. In nature, carbon occures in three forms: diamond, graphite and fulleren.

We are thankful to the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) for providing us with such a great deed so that we could be offering the nanoTruck exhibition during the conference. nanoTruck was one of the key highlights, which conduced to high number of appearances in the public media for the ENF2009 as well (for more please see our media section).

nanoArt Exhibition
We were hosting an artwork exhibition of fourteen gifted artists from literally all around the globe. Main contribution came from Cristian Orfescu, an American based in California, who is an author, producer, coordinator and evaluator of the annually held online competition NanoArt 21 which started back in 2006 and 2009 is going to be a fourth one in a row. It is certainly the first and most probably still the only online competition/exhibition/festival on NanoArt as such. (For more visit the exhibition slide show here). Orfescu himself says he considers NanoArt to be an appealing and very effective way to communicate a reflection and usage of the latest technological and social movements with and within general public as well as plain informing about the technologies of the 21st Century. You had a chance to see 20 masterpieces of Cristian Orfescu at the EuroNanoForum 2009.
As outlined above, thanks to Cris Orfescu's kind cooperation we could also present some of the competitors of the above mentioned contest. Namely: Bjoern Daempfling, Carol Cooper, Darcy Lewis, David Derr, David Hylton, Eva Lewarne, Fred Marinello, Chris Robinson, Philip Brun del Re, Renata Spiazzi, Teja Krasek, Ursula Freer.
Last but not least, we were having a very fruitful and nice cooperation with our crucial media partner: "NANO - the Magazine for Small Science", thanks to which, we got to know a very interesting textile artist and scientist Dr. Frances Geesin, whose artworks you were sure to meet at the conference.
We would like to thank all the artists and especially Cris Orfescu as well as our media partner "NANO - the Magazine for Small Science" for the great cooperation.
We hope you have enjoyed the exhibition, as well as the educational show of the nanoTruck!