Data Harmonization and Sharing in the Nanoinformatics Community

Nanomaterials differ in their properties, interactions, and effects from larger materials made from the same elements. As we harness and engineer them to our benefit, nanoscale materials offer incredible possibilities in applications ranging from targeted drug and agrichemical delivery to computing, renewable energy, and electrical transmission. We also understand now that nanomaterials are ubiquitous in nature, which we began realizing over the past couple of decades as we learned concurrently to make them and to see them. Thus, there is an enormous breadth of materials, product matrices, life cycles, use patterns, and release environments to be studied to understand and predict their behavior. Once released, complex interdependencies between engineered nanomaterials and their surroundings drive a range of transformations, creating even more possible eventualities.