Welcome to the science of the  Very Small!  Nano means "dwarf" in Greek and  nano-technology deals with molecular and atomic particles.  This world is measured in  nanometers, each of which is a billionth of a meter. Here, in this small world, we encounter viruses and molecules.

Research in this field of the teeny-tiny first focused on manufacture of the "small" for industry, medicine and instrumentation.   While past efforts in assembling the "small" have been a bit clumsy, the future will show us spectacular precision in assembling the small to produce behemoth advances.

The Age of Nanotech is considered to have begun with  a talk given in 1959 by physicist Richard Feynman, entitled "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom."  Feynman envisioned a future nano-sized box that could hold all the information known.   Physicists touch Spirit/God all the time, we are told.

The Foresight Institute, founded by Drexler  (an MIT researcher who followed Dr. Feynman) and colleagues, remains a primary source of research. Foresight recently launched Nanodot, a news site for the latest nanotech developments.

We are still in the very early age of nano-technology. Theories and techniques continue to emerge, captivating scientists, students, entrepreneurs, investors, and even the U.S. government, which is betting that nanotechnology could lead to the next industrial revolution. (Where?)

The potential is now vast,  with new materials and methods sprouting daily. It is a prospective story that reads like science fiction.  For a Personal Story of Nanotech Truth that also reads Like Science Fiction:

nano- is a prefix (symbol n) in the SI system of units denoting a factor of 10−9  Ergo nanocube (def.): a cube that is a nanometer wide, deep and long. See Nanomeasure.com

Can a nano-something be trademarked?  Not if it is that something is real and being measured.