The CNSI promotes and facilitates the speedy and robust transfer of nanosystems innovation to the marketplace, and by marrying educational and research opportunities, CNSI produces broadly trained scientists and engineers capable of sustaining California's leadership in nanotechnology into the future. Work done at the CNSI links together nanostructures to produce behaviors and information that grow exponentially with system complexity. To produce and understand such complex nanosystems that incorporate biological and electronic nanostructures requires fundamentally new approaches to modeling, imaging, characterization, and data analysis. The rewards of creating these new approaches and meeting these new challenges, will be great - nothing less than the development of critical technologies that will drive the future of California's economy. Although much of the science pursued within CNSI will have long-term payoffs, several near-term applications will also be realized for both information technologies and molecular medicine.