NANOTECH INNOVATIONS

More than a hundred schools have nanotechnology programs underway, but several of them have earned special distinction.

• HARVARD: Harvard's Materials Research Science and Engineering Center comprises 21 members of the faculty from different departments, including engineering, physics, biology, chemistry, and the medical school. The three main research groups are working on multiscale mechanics of films and interfaces, engineering materials and techniques for biological studies at cellular scales, and interface-mediated assembly of soft materials.

• RICE: Rice is home to the Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology at Rice and Richard Smalley, the Nobel Laureate in chemistry who is a nanotechnology pioneer. The center focuses on wet, dry, and computational nanotechnology, and often works with NASA.

• COLUMBIA: Columbia is home to the Center for Nanostructured Materials. At the center, teams of people work on developing complex metal oxide nanocrystals into thin films that can be used to improve the strength of materials. The center also looks into structurally integrated chemical films that contain nanoparticles.

• CORNELL: Cornell is a member of the National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network. Cornell's focus is in materials science and engineering research, including nanostructured materials in electronic and mechanical devices.

• NORTHWESTERN: Northwestern recently built a 40,000-square-foot Center for Nanofabrication and Molecular Self-Assembly on its Evanston campus. The center was paid for by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which makes it one of the first federally funded facilities dedicated to nanotechnology.

• RENNSSELAER: This institute has a nanotechnology center that studies advanced coating for materials, the nano dimensions of biosciences and biotechnology, nanoelectrics, and nano-scale mechanics and systems.

• BERKELEY: The Nanotechnology Initiative Research Group at University of California at Berkeley focuses on nano-scale engineering, nanocomposites, and nanowires, among other things.

MP3 Players
The advancement of technologies has helped increasing the size of memory. Now we can have tens of gigabytes of space in a very small storage device. The MP3 players we use today use either a flash memory or a mini hard disk for storing data. Flash memory is a large non-volatile storage device like an EEPROM (electrically erasable programmable read-only memory) based on the common CMOS manufacturing technique. This storage technology is rapidly replacing its magnetic predecessor by rising in capacity while diminishing the dimensions of its transistors.

Cooling Systems

The cooling equipment like refrigerators and air conditioning have also been benefited by the nanotechnology revolutions. Silver has been used for antimicrobial purposes in several products. It has helped check the growth of microbes and ensure a healthy and hygienic environment. Now silver is also used in filters for washing machines.

Hard Disks
The hard disks have been able to store such gigantic amount of data due to the use of Giant Magneto Resistance (GMR) effect. It is a quantum mechanical effect. The use of this technology enabled to store well above 100 gigabits per square inch. In current hard disks, the magnetic domains are oriented in-plane, while those of the next generation will stand upright. For reading densely stored data, more sensitive and efficient read-and-write heads are required. It can be achieved through the even more sophisticated Tunneling Magneto Resistance (TMR) effect.