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It's a bit of a long read, but (IMHO) one of the best sources on the matter is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.

He describes the very concept of nanotechnology, defines it as well as much philosophy around it, with plenty of examples of thing that can be done once manufacturing on this scale is achieved.

Such machines do technically already exist, such as the ribosome. Once a similar machine is created that is under complete human control pragmatically, it will be a world altering event.

If you think of the process of a cell performing its work, dividing, assembling its programmed structure, and eventually creating something on the macro scale like a whale or elephant - then you are thinking on the right scale.

The 3D printer referenced in the article is not yet able to produce structures at this scale, let alone functional machines at this scale.
At best it might be one step on the path towards true nanotechnology, as smaller tools build smaller tools and so on.

Some additional material on the subject that found recently was on youtube under productive nanosystems
While this is purely an artists rendering, one video I happened upon that really brings home the scale factor is their nano-factory video.

This is what most people are referring to when using the term nanotechnology.

Not to mention the research on the theory started very long ago.

My personal favorite book on the subject is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.
(The original from 1986 available online.)

The late Robert Bradbury also wrote quite a few related papers with more technical details, such as "Nano assembly of an aircraft carrier", "Planetary Dissembly", and "Molecular Construction Limits"

Exactly how small is possible, and numerous methods to go about it once we are able to construct items that small, and even the planning ahead to prevent the obvious (and not so obvious) disasters related to such technology have already been addressed and answered by many scientists over the last century.

It's not the universities and researchers we need to keep an eye on, they've had their day here. The next major breakthrough will come from the manufacturing sector, and they have quite a ways to go to meet let alone catch up to current theory.

I'll be excited once a similar announcement comes from Intel or IBM or the like, once they have a working prototype.

Posting anon for fear of the mods this post will get for even bringing this up...

If you haven't read it already, you should check out Eric Drexlers "Engines of Creation"
http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC_Table_of_Contents.html

The book itself is his musings on nanotechnology of the future, written about 25 years ago. It does a good job of showing just how far we have gone in that time, and how much further we ultimately have to go yet.

Fortunately, the end results are inevitable, with only time as a variable.
Barring some event such as a huge natural disaster, extinction event, or WW3, we are pretty much guaranteed to get there, and have about 40 years of evidence to show for it.

We have had a few bumps along the path, but have always over come them eventually. It is not a perfect logarithmic scale, but so far we have been on track with only a relatively minor margin for error needed (about 5-6 years or so)

It also does an excellent job of answering questions a lot of slashdot readers come up with after 10 seconds of thinking about the issues, with answers from someone who has thought about them for 10 years.
Not just technical questions, but political and humanitarian questions as well.

make a ship that contained the necessary fuel and so on to get there in one human life span, vital systems in the ship would almost certainly malfunction and the crew would be stranded until they died or something. People need to realize the only way we're getting off this rock is with nanorobotic manufacturing. Nanorobot constructed ships would be smart, and self-repair, fixing any problem that arises. If congress would dedicate a small fraction of that $25 billion NASA is getting to study rocks in outer space to nanorobotics, we'd get indefinite life-spans, space ships that could travel to the Andromeda galaxy never mind a star 20 light years away, an end to poverty, disease, crime, and so on. I suggest everyone read "Engines of Creation" by Drexler, it's free to read and posted on the web. http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC_Table_of_Contents.html

I've long thought that THIS is how intelligent life destroys itself. Basically, technology increases until the power to destroy all life can be used by a single insane individual.
*snip*
There's no way we would know about it, and there's nothing we could do about it.

indeed, this has been predicted as early as the 1950s, and some of our brighter thinkers have even come up with potential solutions 50 years ago.

Unfortunately I think we as a species, or even a collection of nations, will not do what is required to prevent damages and our extinction before it is too late.

The article below by Eric Drexler is specifically in regards to nanotechnology at a level of full remote control or programming ability. We are of course still far off from that, but two things we should agree on are 1) Engineered biology has similar risks to all of humanity, and 2) short of an extinction event, humanity WILL progress with technology.

http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC_Chapter_12.html#section07of10

While it is very true we still have a long way to go, it is worth pointing out that thoughts about the effects of such change have been pondered over before.

Some interesting reading, especially the social aspects in the later chapters, is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.

Full online version: http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC_Table_of_Contents.html
Or it's about a $6 paperback these days.

I think you might find it interesting.

I can think of nothing that would encourage them more than reading works by K. Eric Drexler or Robert Freitas. Though they deal more in the realm of engineering than science and are generally create a picture of possible future paths (molecular nanotechnology & nanomedicine) which can easily inspire people to learn science. The best book for nanotechnology would be Engines of Creation 2.0: http://e-drexler.com/p/06/00/EOC_Cover.html (the paperback 1987 edition is somewhat dated at this point) but you would have to go browsing through the papers by Robert @ http://www.rfreitas.com/ to find something which is for a younger age level. You might even have to read them with your children and explain them. But exploring the realms of the small (nanotechnology) and the large (astronomy) both serve as windows to get children to wonder about the world around them, how it can be understood, and potentially how it can be explored and developed. Tools that allow these explorations (I grew up with both a microscope and a telescope in the house) are helpful as well.

Yesterday I learned about the existence of the 2007 nanotechnology roadmap. Contact me for related ZIP file.

See Engines of Creation.

It's an interesting concept, but it is not in any way a "new" concept. It was, for example, explored in Drexlers "Engines of Creation" that is (in full) available online under http://www.e-drexler.com/ EOC was first published in 1986, so the idea is more than 20 years old.

should read Nanosystems by K. Eric Drexler. Roughly speaking, Drexler is the father of nanomanufacturing. I bought it on a whim when I read about him in the Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson (of Cryptonomicon, Baroque Cycle, In the the Beginning was the Command Line, and Snow Crash fame). Interesting times ahead.

>> This business of calling surface chemistry of finely divided powders "nanotechnology" is a bit much.

That's very true. I'll stick with the definitions given by the founder of the field (ie. Drexler), as it's less subject to commercial and political manipulation. Much of the defining material is freely available online, for anyone who wants their information from the horse's mouth.

First of all there's the online version of Eric Drexler's extremely seminal Engines of Creation. It's a fantastic read, even after all these years.

(The online version of EoC used to be maintained at the Foresight Institute, but it's now kept by Drexler himself above. His whole site is a great resource of course, so clear out the tail of the URL and have a look around.)

Then there's the online version of the popular Unbounding the Future, an easily readable and slightly updated introduction to nanotechnology for everyone, although somehow I find it lacks the charm of Engines of Creation.

But nothing beats his textbook Nanosystems though. This book is a 150% must-have for anyone with a strong interest in nanotechnology, because even if you cannot follow the detailed science and mathematics, the diagrams and tables alone justify the cost.

Unfortunately the online version of Nanosystems is still at a very early stage, and is not really useful except as an online table of contents. Buy the textbook, you won't regret it.