You are here

nanotechnology

Scientists use Nanotechnology to resist wear

In a recently published study, scientists at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, are addressing one of the biggest challenges faced by many appliances - wear and friction due to usage. Wear and friction affects the lifetime of industrial equipment, which directly correlates with the profitability of the business. The teams of researchers, led by Prof. M.S. Bobji at the Department of Mechanical Engineering are now experimenting with alumina based nanocomposite coating for wear resistance.

Jervis

Smaller the size, better the functionality - Certain materials can change polarization and magnetization on shrinking, discover scientists

Ferroelectric materials carry a spontaneously polarized charge within their crystalline structure that can be reversed by the application of an electric field. As scientists try to shrink them to nanometre sizes, these materials often lose their polarization. Now, a collaborative research team from India and Germany has observed an unexpected effect in the ferroelectric alloy of bismuth ferrite and lead titanate (BiFeO3-PbTiO3). They have found that mechanically grinding this material to smaller sizes actually leads to a different atomic arrangement - a new structural phase that retains the polarization with slight alteration. This discovery opens up interesting possibilities for using this ferroelectric material in a variety of miniaturised devices - computer memory, RFIDs, sensors and actuators.

Rajashree Nori

Scientists investigate zinc oxide nanostructures for biomedical applications

Nanotechonology, the field of science that manipulates objects at atomic or molecular level, is tout to be the science of the future. Researchers across the globe are working rigorously to tapthe potential this possesses. In a recent multinational collaborative study, researchers from the Indian Institute of Science(IISc), Bangalore, the Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK, and the Georg-August-Universität, Göttingen, Germany, have tried exploring the biomedical applicability of zinc oxide (ZnO) nanostructures. The results of this study have opened up novel possibilities in nanoscience research, especially pertaining to the field of biomedicine.

Arul Ganesh

Nanotechnology in India: current status and future prospects

One possible means of bridging the gap between India’s abundant, varied natural resources and her ever-increasing requirements like clean water, food and rapid, low cost diagnostic machinery is the use of nanotechnology, write Arindam Ghosh and Yamuna Krishnan in the international journal Nature Nanotechnology.

Arati Halbe