|
What is nano?
Nano-technology (greek. νάννος [nános] = dwarf) is the name for the research in
- cluster physics and surface physics,
- semiconductor physics ,
- areas of chemistry
- The so far very limited subranges of mechanical engineering.
This popular-scientific comprehensive term bases on the magnitude of the single atom, all nano-research areas subordinate a structural size of 100 nanometers (Nm). A nanometer is a billionth meter (10-9 m).
This order of magnitude designates a frontier, in which the surface properties play a larger role in relation to the volume characteristics of the materials and increasingly quantum-physical effects must be considered.
Today the nano-materials, which are manufactured mostly in a chemical way or with mechanical methods, already play an important role. Some of them are commercially available and used in commercial products, others are important model systems for the physicochemical and material-scientific research. Important are also nano-electronics, whose “affiliation” to the nano-technology is seen different in scientific and research-political practice.
A trend of the nano-technology can be regarded as continuation and extension of the micro technology (“top down beginning”) - but a further reduction of micrometer structures usually requires completely unorthodox new beginnings. Chemistry often goes the other way in the nano-technology: “bottom up”. Chemists, who usually work in molecular, i.e. sub-nano dimensions, compose larger nano-scaled molecule groups out of a multiplicity of individual molecule units. An example for that are Dendrimeres.
|
|
Only a small branch of the nano-technology is occupied with nano-machines or Nanobots.
The Federal Republic of Germany, in particular the Saarland, is leading the intensive research and production of the nano-technology and its products world-wide.
To give you an idea:
A nano-structural component behaves in the size to a football like the football to the earth. So far the construction in nano-dimensions was a domain of nature: Since millions of years it “builds” our world from plants, animals and humans after this proven basic principle. Today the nano-technology also uses these methods and takes them even further.
A glass surfaces modified with nano-coating is equipped with hydrophobic (water-rejecting) and dirt-deflecting characteristics, in order to obtain self-cleaning characteristics. To achieve these characteristics a new surface layer is applied on an already existing (smooth and non-hydrophobic) surface. Nano-coating consists of at least two layers: The first layer is the connection between the existing surface and the new, nano or macro-structured layer. Nano-coatings go in a physical connection with an existing surface, like a wallpaper e.g..
|
