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Nanoscience & Nanotechnology

Key Concepts:

What is special about small?
Tools of Nanoscience
Nanotech & Nano-Enabled Products
Nano@VT & NanoEarth

2022 Nanoscience Professional Development Workshop

Credit: NASA

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Credit: Virginia Tech

What images come to mind �when you hear the terms �“nanoscience” or “nanotechnology”?

http://geckoclix.blogspot.com

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Credit: Virginia Tech

“Barberbots”

http://geckoclix.blogspot.com

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Credit: Virginia Tech

“Barberbots”

Simply meant to illustrate how nano is about making small things that we can control in terms of properties and behaviors

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Credit: Virginia Tech

For a long time, we have been working hard to make technology smaller…

1937

1960

2001

MicroElectroMechanical Systems (MEMS)

0.02 – 1 mm

Avg. dust mite 0.2 – 0.3 mm

<1/64^th of an inch (~0.4 mm)

Made by Bill McLellan

Caltech, 1950

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What is special about small things?

Surface plasmon resonance effect involving collective oscillation of conduction electrons
Tunable (NP size, shape, composition)

Credit: Virginia Tech

nanoComposix

Nanosized particles can behave differently from macroscale counterparts

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What is special about small things?

The properties and behaviors of materials can change dramatically when size reaches the nanoscale (<<100 nm)

This is nanoscience.

Ruby (Al₂O₃)

Aluminum oxidizes resulting in a thin film (~1 nm thick) Al₂O₃ coating

Aluminum Metal

Conductor of electricity

Insulator: Does not conduct electricity

How to we know?

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What is special about small things?

We can image at the atomic scale.

Nguyen et al. (2018) ACS Appl. Mats. & Interfaces 10, 2230-2235.

1 nm

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Tools of Nanoscience & Nanotechnology

www.jeol.co.jp

www.york.ac.uk

Transmission�Electron�Microscope�(TEM)

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Tools of Nanoscience & Nanotechnology

Atomic Force�Microscope�(AFM)

Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM)

Credit: Univ. of Washington

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Nanoscience Enables Technology

RIKEN

Wiley-VCH

SciTech Europa

Reuters

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Nanomedicine

ETPN

Many areas in medicine are benefitting from nanoscience and nanotechnology

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ETPN

Nanomedicine

Image credit: DDW

Synthetic nanomedicine carriers are being developed to deliver vaccines or targeted drug delivery

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Nano-Enabled Consumer Products

www.theconversation.com

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Nano-Enabled Consumer Products

www.illumin.usc.edu

www.nanotextiles.human.cornell.edu

Google images

PNAS

Google images

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Nanoscience helps us to understand how the world works…

Google images

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Nano@VT

Currently ~90 majors in nanoscience and nanomedicine
Taught by diverse faculty specializing in Biology, Chemistry, Geosciences, and Physics

Interdisciplinary curriculum with hands-on learning
Students trained to understand and tackle real-world problems involving health, energy, water and the environment, etc.

Credit: Virginia Tech

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Nano@VT

Nanomedicine majors lean to the right (more biology)

Nanoscience majors lean to the left (more physics & math)

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NanoEarth is an NSF-funded center with the mission to stimulate discovery and innovation, and to share knowledge of Earth and environmental nanoscience and nanotechnology.