It would be hard to find a European city that had a worse reputation than Bartovia’s, with crime, rubbish, graffiti and dereliction featuring in every description over the last 60 years. With unemployment running at 11%, the city government essentially bankrupt, and the population actually falling as young people leave in droves, there were few bright spots in Bartovia’s future.

One of the few, however, is a new venture run by Sergio Leone, a nano-chemist who had returned to the city of his birth to try and made the impossible a reality.