Nanotechnology involves working with materials at the nanoscale, between 1-100 nanometers. At this scale, materials exhibit new properties and functions. Nanotechnology is being applied in various fields including information technology, energy, medicine, and consumer goods. It allows for smaller, more powerful electronics, more efficient energy production like solar cells, targeted drug delivery, and improved materials. While nanotechnology provides benefits, potential risks also exist regarding its effects on human health, the environment, and society which require further study.
2. What is Nanotechnology?
Nanotechnology is the creation of functional materials,
devices and systems, through the understanding and
control of matter at dimensions in the nanometer scale
length (1-100 nm), where new functionalities and
properties of matter are observed.
A nanometer is one billionth of a meter that is 10-9
meter.
Materials with minimum feature sizes less than 100
nanometers are considered to be products of
nanotechnology.
3. What is Nanoscale
1.27 × 107 m 0.22 m 0.7 × 10-9 m
12,756 Km 22 cm 0.7 nm
10 millions times
smaller
1 billion times
smaller
4. How small is Nano?
A sheet of paper is about 100,000 nanometers thick.
A strand of human DNA is 2.5 nanometers in diameter.
There are 25,400,000 nanometers in one inch.
A human hair is approximately 80,000- 100,000
nanometers wide.
A single gold atom is about a third of a nanometer in
diameter.
Your fingernails grow at the rate of about 1 nanometer
per second.
single hemoglobin molecule - 5 nanometers across
5. Nanotechnology Applications
Information Technology
• Smaller, faster, more
energy efficient and
powerful computing
and other IT-based
systems
Energy
• More efficient and cost
effective technologies for
energy production
− Solar cells
− Fuel cells
− Batteries
− Bio fuels
6. Medicine
Consumer Goods
• Foods and beverages
−Advanced packaging materials,
sensors, and lab-on-chips for
food quality testing
• Appliances and textiles
−Stain proof, water proof and
wrinkle free textiles
• Household and cosmetics
− Self-cleaning and scratch free
products, paints, and better
cosmetics
• Cancer treatment
• Bone treatment
• Drug delivery
• Appetite control
• Drug development
• Medical tools
• Diagnostic tests
• Imaging
7. Nanoscale Devices and
Integrated Nanosystems
− Currently available microprocessors use
resolutions as small as 32 nm
− Houses up to a billion transistors in a single chip
− MEMS based nanochips have future capability of 2
nm cell leading to 1TB memory per chip
Nanochip
8. − Fuel cells use hydrogen and air as fuels
and produce water as by product
− The technology uses a nanomaterial
membrane to produce electricity
Fuel Cells
9. Drug Delivery Systems
Impact of nanotechnology on drug delivery systems:
− Targeted drug delivery
− Improved delivery of poorly water soluble drugs
− Co-delivery of two or more drugs
− Imaging of drug delivery sites using imaging
modalities
10. Benefits of Nanotechnology
environmentally benign material abundance for all by
providing universal clean water supplies
atomically engineered food and crops resulting in
greater agricultural productivity with fewer labor
requirements
nutritionally enhanced interactive ‘smart’ foods.
cheap and powerful energy generation
clean and highly efficient manufacturing
radically improved formulation of drugs, diagnostics and
organ replacement
much greater information storage and
communication capacities
11. Potential Risks
Health issues - the effects of nanomaterial on human
biology
Environmental issues - the effects of nanomaterial on
the environment
Societal issues - the effects that the availability of
Nano technological devices will have on politics and
human interaction