Nanoscience and nanotechnology hold great promises, and consequently they
have been the subject of a tremendous research effort. The global investment
by governments since the year 2000 is currently around USD 100 billion. The
nanotechnology-related budget of the Seventh Framework Programme for
Research and Technological Development (2007-2013) of the European
Union, only considering transnational cooperative projects, has been of J 3.5
billion.1 Strengthening science through frontier research and improving
industrial competitiveness are widely believed to be boosted by nanosciences
and nanotechnologies. Nowadays, several applications and devices enabled
by nanotechnologies have become mature, and are gradually flooding the
market in the industrial sectors of catalysis, reinforced materials and
nanocomposites, optoelectronics, biotechnologies, and so on. However, the
same nanotech community also admits that some issues still need to be
addressed in order to fully exploit the undoubted, enormous potential of
nanomaterials. Among critical challenges, one should mention the still
relatively limited throughput of nano-production technologies, the urgent
need to combine nanoparticle fabrication technologies with the highest
possible chemical and biological flexibility, thus eventually developing unique
and low-cost fabrication platforms that could impact on different industrial
fields, and, last but not least, regulatory issues related to nanoparticle
toxicology. Polymer nanofibers are a relatively recently developed class of
nanomaterials, which can offer solutions to many of these critical issues, thus
potentially giving actual perspectives of socio-economic impact to future
nanotechnologies.