Background: What is nanotechnology?
The Past Four Decades
In 1974 the term nanotechnology itself was coined by Norio Taniguchi at the University of
Tokyo. Taniguchi, perceived engineering at the micrometer scale-so-called
micro-technology-from a new, sub-micrometer level, which he dubbed "nano-technology."
In 1986, MIT researcher Eric Drexler wrote "Engines of Creation", the book widely credited
with bringing nanotech into the public's consciousness.
At the same time, researchers at the American Rice University were studying a bizarre
molecule. By vaporizing carbon and allowing it to condense in an inert gas, Richard
Smalley's research team observed that the carbon formed highly stable crystals of sixty
atoms apiece. They suspected the crystals shared the familiar soccer-ball structure used
in architect R. Buckminster Fuller's geodesic domes, and named their discovery
"buckminsterfullerene," which was quickly shortened to "fullerene," or "buckyball."
The buckyball remains nanotechnology's most famous discovery. It earned Smalley and
his colleagues the 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and cemented nanotechnology's
reputation as a cutting-edge research field.
Having explained the prefix, it wouldn't do to overlook the workaday root. Nanotechnology
is not just the study of the very small -- it is also very much a technology.
Israel's Growing Infatuation with Nanotechnology
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem recently set up a new $40 million center for
nanoscience and nanotechnology. The center will be part of the Faculty of Science for
research and development.
In another six months, the university will inaugurate one [physical] component, the center
for
microcharacterization and electron microscopy.
What is being launched now is the official cross-disciplinary activity, the essence of
nanoscience research. Hebrew University scientists from the physics, chemistry,
engineering and life science faculties, many of whom are already working at the nanoscale,
will be carrying out joint research projects and inviting guest speakers.
The Hebrew University is not alone in this endeavor: Ben-Gurion University, Tel Aviv
University, and the Technion all announced major investments in nanoscience and
nanotechnology over the past 18 months.
A recent nanotechnology symposium brought academics together to explain the founding
principles of nanotechnology to venture capital funds.
"We believe that this is one of the hottest subjects in science: basic science which you
can use in the foreseeable future for useful products [in industry]," said Professor Magidor
of the Hebrew University. "The first useful products are probably a decade away, but we will
be prepared," Magidor continued. "As the major research center in Israel, we should be the
major player [in nanoscience],' he said. 'There is already some interest from industry. Now
we are saying to them: we are here."
The View to the Future
Research that built on Smalley's buckyballs led to the discovery of crystal carbon tubes,
similar in structure to buckyballs, but many thousands of atoms long. That has led
scientists to envision a wide range of applications-from nanoscale electronics to super
materials and to tiny machines.
The first working electronic component for the nanocircuits of the future, for example, was
created at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa. Called a nanowire, it's a
string of tiny particles of silver, a thousand times thinner than a human hair, which actually
passes a current.
Israeli physicist Uri Sivan fathered the nanowire, together with fellow physicist Erez Braun
and chemist Yoav Eichen. The Technion team synthesized strands of DNA - the molecule
that makes up genes - to make a scaffolding for the wire. Because DNA is an insulator
which does not conduct electrical current, they attached grains of silver along the scaffold.
The resulting nanowire is three times thinner than those created for microchips.
Prof. Jacob Sagiv, a materials scientist at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot,
has built three-dimensional structures out of molecules. One of these structures is shaped
like a Star of David, each of its sides only 1,000th the width of a human hair.
Prof. Reshef Tenne, also from Weizmann, searched with colleagues in his department and at
Oxford University in Britain for molecules to act as switches in computer memory. Unable to
find this in nature, they shaped a single layer of nickel-chloride molecules into a sphere.
This has not only produced highly reliable magnetic memory switches, it has also led to
the creation of tiny molecular pipes.
The Weizmann Institute-developed nanotubes have been warmly welcomed by Prof. Aaron
Lewis, director of the Laser Center at the Hadassah Medical Organization in Jerusalem (as
previously reported by IHTIR). Prof. Lewis and Prof. Tenne both believe the nanotubes will
extend the use of the recently developed nanomicroscope, now in use from Beijing to
Stanford.
"In this microscope, light is passed through a hole only nanometers in dimension, allowing
us to examine single genes and even single proteins, and how they attach themselves on
the cell surface,'' says
Prof. Lewis.
Punching glass to make a hole only 10 nanometers wide for the microscope demanded the
creation of new technology. This knowledge led, in turn, to the development of tiny glass
tubes into which Lewis slid an even tinier metal wire, creating an instrument that functions
like a surgical laser with a wide range of different lasers depending on the electric pulses
sent through it. A fraction of the cost of a variety of surgical lasers, it is now in clinical
trials at Hadassah.
Another tool that evolved from the new technology is what Prof. Lewis calls a
nano-fountain pen. It is, in fact, a hollow nanotube, which can deposit chemicals at
nanodimensions. Its uses may include chemically altering faulty genes. Two Israeli
startups are developing products and services based on the Prof Lewis' scientific work.
The Jerusalem Venture Partners VC fund has announced an investment of $1m in US
company NanoTectonica. This marks the first time that an Israeli fund has invested in
nanotechnology. The financing round was led by the world's leading venture capital fund,
Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers.
Nanotechnology is the art of manipulating matter at the atomic scale. It crosses and unites
academic fields such as physics, chemistry, biology and even computer science.
Nano- the exotic prefix
Derived from the Greek word for midget, "nano" means 10-9, a billionth part. A nanometer
(abbreviated nm), for example, is one billionth of a meter. An atom measures about
one-third of a nanometer. The diameter of a human hair-a measurement notable as
nanotechnology's greatest cliché-is about 200,000 nm.
In 1959, the Nobel prize winning physicist Richard Feynman said "There's plenty of room at
the bottom." In this speech, he envisioned a discipline devoted to manipulating smaller and
smaller units of matter. Feynman continued, "Ultimately-in the great future-we can arrange
the atoms the way we want; the very atoms, all the way down!"
Of late, Israel's major institutes of higher learning have been busy in establishing
nanotechnology research and development facilities. The level of funding varies, but the
promise is that the resultant research "has the potential to change everything".
In spite of the rush towards supporting basic research in scientific and academic circles,
there is much discussion about what nanotechnology will make possible and when -- and if
the pursuit of nanotechnology is ultimately worth the effort.
Currently, nanotechnology labs focus on basic research, but they hope one day to apply
their discoveries to nearly all branches of technology. Already, research points to
revolutionary advances in materials, pharmaceuticals and information technology.