What is nano?
The term 'nano' originates from the greek word meaning 'dwarf'. Mathematically nano is represented by 10-9 which equates to one-billionth. Therefore 1 nanometre (nm) is one billionth of a meter.
Although this sounds small it's hard to comprehend so let's put it into perspective (see image below).
Nanotechnology
Nanotechnology and its supporting nanoscience involve the precise manipulation and control of atoms and molecules, the building blocks of all matter, to create novel materials with properties controlled at the nanoscale. With its ability to see, manipulate and manufacture on the smallest of scales, nanotechnology is widely accepted as a fundamental ‘enabling technology’ of the 21st century and in some areas is expected to become a ‘disruptive technology’ promising massive change.
The ultimate goal is to produce new materials, devices and systems tailored to meet the needs of a growing range of commercial, scientific, engineering and medical applications — opening new markets and yielding benefits in product performance. Its impact will be far reaching, providing not only cost and performance improvements to current products and processes but, in the longer term, yielding new approaches to societal and commercial problems.
Seen as crucial to the competitiveness of a wide range of industries, nanotechnology will confer advantages in the form of improved products, whole new lines of products, lower-cost manufacturing processes and greener manufacturing. Broadly, two production approaches exist; the bottom-up and the top-down.
Bottom-up
This approach involves physically manipulating small numbers of the basic building blocks, either individual atoms or more complex molecules, into larger structures using (self) directed growth or minute (physical or field based) probes.
Top-down
This second approach involves the systematic removal of material from a precursor (e.g. bulk silicon or a polymer) using a chemical, optical, thermal or atomic bombardment technique to form complex smaller structures. Importantly, both approaches can work within biological and non-biological systems, bridging important divides between these two worlds.
Working in this pervasive technology therefore requires a detailed understanding of the underlying physical, chemical and biological processes across a range of scientific disciplines at nanoscale. Indeed, at this scale the full range of sciences begin to come together and the new challenge is to create and share a common scientific and management language such that effective interdisciplinary interaction is maximised.
Applications of nanotechnology
Nanotechnology already exists in products widely used today such as sunscreen and paint.
Also, as practical examples of nanotechnology we can imagine:
- the design of minute drug doses tailored to an individual for optimal treatment of disease;
- the establishment of new, low-cost, real-time, high-resolution, clinical diagnostic techniques;
- the manufacture of computers with memories a thousand times larger than a current desktop PC but which take up only the same space or less;
- the production of intelligent materials for the aerospace industry;
- or the fabrication of sensors which could test the results of a million different chemical reactions simultaneously to assist product manufacture or environmental monitoring.
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