In this new, hybrid field, called bioelectronics, Japan boasts of a lead in moving from lab to market. "Japan is ahead, without a doubt," says Isao Karube, biotechnology professor at Tokyo Institute of Technology.
A big part of that lead is a tiny device created by fusing organic matter to electrodes. Called a biosensor, the device converts natural chemical reactions into electric current to measure blood-sugar levels, monitor the brewing of beer, sniff out pollution, pick the freshest fish in the market or become a robot's "nose."
"It's the same old story," says Christopher Lowe, director of the biotechnology center at Britain's Cambridge University. Biosensors "have been targeted in the usual, thorough way." The West still leads in basic biosensor studies…. But the Japanese "will walk away with the commercial applications in this area," he says.
Accepting foreign students is an American tradition that we must continue, in part because ...
