ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of the role and importance of nanotechnologies and nanosciences for innovation, entrepreneurship and growth in the 21st century. Since the insurgence of nanotechnologies, it has been clear, to those involved in their studies and applications, that their future importance for creating new goods or services, or for rejuvenating old ones, would be relevant. A “radical innovation” is an innovation exploring new forms or technologies, is highly uncertain and risky, and possibly needs high knowledge inputs. Incremental innovation” is on the contrary less risky and less rewarding. The division is obviously rough, and it is not always the case that an invention is “purely” radical or incremental. Bibliometric studies are fundamental to understand where research is performed, how it has evolved and which research topics are mostly undertaken by scientists. A relevant number of scientific works deal with sciento-metric studies related to specific nanotech topics or issues.
