Nanotechnology: Thinking Big, Working Small

Nanotechnology: Thinking Big, Working Small

Do you want to discover the great power of small?. You will be wonderstruck to know the incredibly powerful world of Nanotechnology

What is Nanotechnology?

Nanotechnology is novel science, engineering, and technology, which manipulates materials at the nanoscale (1-100 nm). Nanotechnology is about looking at the world on such a tiny scale that we can not only see the atoms, but we can fabricate and move those atoms around and create new things. Nanotechnology is a construction on a tiny scale.

Nanoparticles:

The term nanoparticle is a mixture of the words ìnanosî (Greek: dwarf) and ìparticulumî (Latin: particle).Nanoparticles are ultrafine structures with dimensions less than 100 nm. Nanoparticles had been used since long in history. In the fourth- century A. D. Roman glass makers fabricated glass using metallic nanoparticles. An artifact called the Lycurgus cup placed in the British museum in London belongs to that period. This cup was made by sodalimeglass which was stained by silver and gold nanoparticles. The cup changes its color from green to deep red when it is illuminated.

The beautiful colors of the windows of the medieval cathedral churches is because of the presence of different metallic nanoparticles.Although medieval artisans didn’t know they were using it, nanotechnology played a key part in creating stained-glass windows. Medieval stained-glass was created by trapping gold nanoparticles in the 'glass matrix' to create a red colour. Silver nanoparticles, meanwhile, gave it a deep yellow colour.

Why are Nanoparticles Unique?

When the size of the particles is less than 70 nm van der waals force is developed which gives nanoparticles unique features . Gecko can climb the walls and walk on ceilings because of the presence of minute hair much less than 100 nm on their limbs. Because of these very thin hair, adhesion is achieved.

Bulk gold is yellow in color but gold nanoparticles are of blue to wine red colour.

Aluminum nanoparticles are extremely reactive when their size is less than 20 nm.

The fascinating aspect of nano is change in properties of particles when they are very small.

Because of unique properties nanoparticles have promising applications that will revolutionize the world.