The basic definition of nanotechnology is anything related to the building of materials on a nanometer scale-a scale smaller than one millionth of a meter, that evolved over the years via terminology drift to mean
"anything smaller than micro
technology" such as nano
powders, and other things that
are nanoscale in size, but not
referring to mechanisms that hav
e been purposefully built from
nanoscale components.
Nanotechnology represents the state of the art in advances in microbiology, biochemistry, physics, computer science and mathematics. The major research objectives in nanotechnology are the design, modeling, and fabrication of molecular machines and molecular devices. At the end it is not the meaning behind the terms that is important, it is the fact that all the many definitions suggest that we have been and are on a rapidly accelerating technological rollercoaster, and rapid change is the track it rides. While there is great debate as to when nanotechnology will start to seriously impact us, best guesses range from around 2015 to as late as 2025.Certainly within the lifetime of most everyone currently under 60years of age. A key ingredient in understanding nanotechnology is realizing precisely what it is and what it isn't,I am talking about research and development in the length scale of 0.1nanometer to 100 nanometers to create unique structure devices and systems. In many instances the actual structures, device will be much larger, but they will be classified as nanotechnology due to the fact that they will either be created at the nanoscale or nanotechnology will enable them to perform improved functions.
Many materials once they are individually reduced below 100 nanometers, begin displaying a set of unique characteristics based on quantum mechanical forces that are exhibited at the level. The properties of those products depend on how those atoms are arranged. If we rearrange the atoms in coal we can make diamond. If we rearrange the atoms in sand we can make computer chips. If we rearrange the atoms in dirt, water and air we can make potatoes.
In the future, nanotechnology will let us take off the boxing gloves. We'll be able to snap together the fundamental building blocks of nature easily, inexpensively and in most of the ways permitted by the laws of physics. This will be essential if we are to continue the revolution in computer hardware beyond about the next decade, and will also let us tabulate an entire new generation of products that are cleaner, stronger, lighter and more precise.
The improvements in lithography have resulted in sub-micron lithography is clearly very valuable but it is equally clear that conventional lithography will not let us build semiconductor devices in which individual atoms are located at specific lattice sites. Many of the exponentially improving trends in computer hardware capability have remained steady for the last 50 years. There is fairly widespread belief that these trends are likely to continue for at least another several years, but then conventional lithography starts to reach its limits.
If we are to continue these trends we will have to develop a new manufacturing technology which will let us inexpensively build computer systems with mole quantities of logic elements that are molecular in both size and precision and are interconnected in complex and highly idiosyncratic patterns. Nanotechnology will let us do this.
One great example is how nanoparticles are being used to target anticancer drugs directly to cancer cells to kill them without harming nearby non-cancerous cells. This is a great way to reap the benefits of anticancer drugs without the unwanted side effects of drug toxicity. As advancements in nanotechnology continue, the resulting health benefits will also improve and give us more options for use in disease treatment.
Nanotechnology is an emerging and promising field of research, loosely defined as the study of functional structures with dimensions in the 1-1000 nanometer range. Certainly, many organic chemists have designed and fabricated such structures for decades via chemical synthesis. During the last decade, however, developments in the areas of microbiology, silicon fabrication, biochemistry, physical chemistry, and computational engineering have converged to provide remarkable capabilities for understanding, fabricating and manipulating structures at the atomic level.
Research in nanoscience is exploding, both because of the intellectual allure of constructing matter and molecules one atom at a time, and because the new technical capabilities permit creation of materials and devices with significant societal impact. The rapid evolution of this new science and the opportunities for its application promise that nanotechnology will become one of the dominant technologies of the 21st century.
"Wet" nanotechnology, which is the study of biological systems that exist primarily in a water environment. The functional nanometer-scale structures of interest here are genetic material, membranes, enzymes and other cellular components. The success of this nanotechnology is amply demonstrated by the existence of living organisms whose form, function, and evolution are governed by the interactions of nanometer-scale structures.
"Dry" nanotechnology, which derives from surface science and physical chemistry, focuses on fabrication of structures in carbon, silicon, and other inorganic materials. Unlike the "wet" technology, "dry" techniques admit use of metals and semiconductors. The active conduction electrons of these materials make them too reactive to operate in a "wet" environment, but these same electrons provide the physical properties that make "dry" nanostructures promising as electronic, magnetic, and optical devices. Another objective is to develop "dry" structures that possess some of the same attributes of the self-assembly that the wet ones exhibit. The predictive and analytical power of computation is critical to success in nanotechnology: nature required several hundred million years to evolve a functional "wet" nanotechnology; the insight provided by computation should allow us to reduce the development time of a working "dry" nanotechnology to a few decades, and it will have a major impact on the "wet" side as well.
Benefits become practical with nanotechnology:
sPollution control, treatment, and management
sControl of famine and starvation
sCost effective consumer products
sTechnology many times faster then today
sPreserved the right for the education of every one
sIntroduction of the Solar System
sSafe and affordable space travel
sPrevention of illness, aging, and even death.
0 comments
Post a Comment