The mission of Nanofab is supporting research and innovation of the enterprises. It is part of Veneto Nanotech, the Italian Cluster of Nanotechnology, and was realized in 2003. Nowadays Nanofab is constituted by Civen (the association of the three Universities of Padova, Venezia and Verona), Veneto Nanotech, VEGA (the Venice Getaway for Science and Technology), the Chamber of Commerce of Venice and Veneto Innovazione.

Nanofab research activities are mainly focused on the following fields:

- surface treatments and coating deposition for mechanical, protective, decorative, functional applications;

- nanostructured light alloys with high mechanical performances obtained by means of High Velocity Compaction and sintering of metallic powders;

- nanostructured polymers for mechanical and functional applications;

- sensors and biosensors for environmental monitoring, food control, gene expression investigation and microbiological diagnosis;

- monitoring of fine, ultrafine and nanoparticles in workplaces air, to estimate the exposure of workers involved in nanotechological processes.

Nanofab laboratories are equipped with 3 clean rooms and more than 80 instruments. Among them some advanced characterization tools like atomic force, electron and optical microscopes, compositional analysis and many others can be used for fully investigating the properties of nanostructured materials.