Nano-Age E-Book

Mario Pagliaro

• Herausgeber: Wiley-VCH
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 236

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011

Beschreibung

Sehen wir die Nanotechnologie zu euphorisch, oder kann sie wirklich Antworten auf drängende Fragen der Zukunft geben? In acht Kapiteln widmet sich dieser spannend geschriebene Band den zentralen Aspekten der Nano-Revolution. Argumentiert wird anhand von Beispielen aus verschiedensten Bereichen von der Energieproduktion und Nachhaltigkeit bis zur Pharmazie. Unterhaltend, zum Nachdenken anregend -- eine Pflichtlektüre für jeden, der wissen will, wohin uns die Nanotechnologie bringen kann.

Leseprobe

Contents

Preface

References

About the Author

1 Capturing Sun’s Energy

1.1 Solar Power: Now

1.2 Never Trust the Skeptics

1.3 Solar Power for the Masses

1.4 Why Nanoscience is Relevant to the Solar Energy Industry

1.5 Expanding the Solar Business

1.6 Solar Hydrogen from Water

References

2 From Chemistry to Nanochemistry

2.1 Why Small is Different

2.2 Nanochemistry, the Chemical Approach to Nanotechnology

2.3 An Insight into Chemical Methodology

2.4 Making Nanomaterials

References

3 Storing and Supplying Clean Energy

3.1 Ending the Era of the Internal Combustion Engine

Nanotechnology-Based Batteries

3.3 Biological Fuel Cells

3.4 Fuel Cells for the People

References

4 Catalysis: Greening the Pharma Industry

4.1 Pharma: An Industry to Be Cleaned Up

4.2 Sol-Gel Catalysts: Philosopher’s Stones

4.3 Biogels: Marriage of Glass and Life [17]

4.4 Nanocatalysts: Abating Polluting Emissions and Product Contamination

References

5 Organically Doped Metals

5.1 A Watershed Development in Science

5.2 The New Reactivity of Metal-Entrapped Molecules

5.3 Two-for-One-Catalyst

5.4 Chiral Metals

References

6 Protecting Our Goods and Conserving Energy

6.1 Multifunctional Nanocoatings

6.2 Multifunctional Textiles

6.3 Protecting Cultural Heritage

6.4 Protecting Goods from Light

References

7 Better Medicine Through Nanochemistry

7.1 Nanomedicine

7.2 Hemostasis: Change in Surgery and Emergency Medicine

7.3 Biogels: Biotechnology Made Possible

7.4 Small is Beautiful? Nanotech Cosmetics

7.5 Nanotechnology in Orthopedics

7.6 A Hybrid, Welcome Science

References

8 Getting There Cleanly

8.1 Why Sustainable Nanotechnology?

8.2 Regulating Nanomaterials

8.3 Greening Nanomaterials

8.4 Understand the Risks and Minimize Them

8.5 Communicating the Nanotech Risk

References

9 Managing (Nano)innovation

9.1 Scholars, and not Researchers

9.2 Renewing Management and Scientific Education

9.3 Nexus of the Sciences

9.4 In Praise of Scientific Culture

9.5 Communicating Nanochemistry

References

Index

Related Titles

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Nanotechnology

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The Author

Prof. Mario Pagliaro CNR

Ist. Materiali Nanostrutturati

via Ugo La Malfa 153

90146 Palermo

Italien

Cover

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Preface

While sitting after lunch with the economist Loretta Napoleoni in front of Sicily’s splendid sea, Loretta made the rather straightforward statement that “Nanotechnology will save usfrom a global collapse.” She went on explaining her argument for another two hours.

When a field of science becomes the subject of discussion for non-scientists, and for members of the economic elite in particular, I become interested. And so probably are readers in the political, economic, and media communities out there.

When most people think of nanotechnology – if they think of nano technology at all – common images are futuristic tiny robots, performing advanced surgery or being deployed on the battle ground. Well, forget about this hype.

Is there anything really relevant for society in the hype surrounding “nanotechnology” that is creating and manipulating objects whose functions are due to dimensions or components at a billionth of a meter scale?

Investors and wise readers who remember the dot-com bubble and subsequent burst, please be patient. Predicting the future of fast-moving technical fields is difficult, but, yes, there is much of relevance for you and for society here, after the wheat is separated from the chaff.

Nanotechnology is a new and vitally important area of interdisciplinary scientific research that has gone global. It actually is materials chemistry at the nanoscale, or nanochemistry. Like chemistry, it has to do with how we make useful things.

Chemists have invented all manner of stuff – drugs, plastics, fertilizers, glasses, dyes, explosives, contact lenses, textiles, solar panels, ink, coatings, fuels… – that have had such a broad impact on the everyday’s life of all of us.

Now and in the near future chemists working in co-operation with other scientists will provide society with a wide variety of new (nano)materials for a myriad applications of immense practical importance, spanning the fields of chemistry and physics, materials science and engineering, biology, and medicine.

Indeed, the boundaries that have separated these traditional chemistry disciplines in the twentieth century, and chemistry from other disciplines such as physics, biology, and engineering, have broken down to create one large multidisciplinary community with a keen scientific and technological interest in “all” aspects of the chemistry of materials at the nanoscale.

A true chemistry of materials has emerged in the last 15 years as scientists from all disciplines have learned how to synthesize and exploit new types of materials from individual or groups of nanoscale building-blocks that have been intentionally designed to exhibit useful properties with purposeful function and utility [1].

Such techniques generally rely on formulas that control the precise, bottom-up chemical assembly of molecules into geometric structures composed of many molecules. Molecular self-assembly techniques for instance now give us the unprecedented capability of designing and creating nanos-tructured materials with novel properties.

In practice, synthetic chemistry is now used to make nanoscale building blocks with controlled size and shape, composition, surface structure, and functionality that can be useful in their own right or in a self-assembled structure. In addition, since the properties of a (nano)material emerge from the composition, size, shape, and surface properties of these individual building-blocks, chemists are becoming increasingly able to synthesize, from the bottom-up, tailor-made materials.

Beyond research, powerful trends are already evident in business. Not only do a growing number of start-up companies now commercialize products obtained via the nanochemistry approach but also national laboratories, military establishments, and the very big chemical companies have entered the field and joined the race for new and exciting nanomaterials.

Trends in public and private funding of nanotechnology have evolved accordingly. Global research funding in the USA, Russia, Canada, Japan, China, India, Korea, and the EU is in the range of billions of dollars.

In Nano-Hype David Berube concluded that:

“much of what is sold as ‘nanotechnology’ is in fact a recasting of previous materials science, which is leading to a nanotech industry built solely on selling nanotubes, nanowires, and the like which will end up with a few suppliers selling low margin products in huge volumes” [2].

Or, even better said:

“In the 1990s keywords for research projects were ‘green’, ‘environmentally friendly’ and ‘high throughput’. Then we had ‘supramo-lecular’, ‘miniaturisation’ and ‘interface’. And now, it is ‘nano’ everywhere. But what is nanotechnology? We need to stop abusing this word ‘nano’. If we define ‘nano’ by scale alone, then most chemists are working on ‘nanochemistry’. Indeed I found that some scientists have started to label anything small as ‘nano’. Three years ago, I went to a nanobiotechnology meeting at London and found about half of the presentations have very little to do with real nanotechnology. One of the keynote lectures was on measuring movements of wings of insects at the nanometre scale. Others were just pictures of nanocrystals of some biological samples (we called them ‘crystallites’ in the past)… For example, there was a presentation on enzymatic catalysis and enzyme inhibitors – while an enzyme molecule is around a few nanometres wide, are they really ‘ nano-catalysts’? Or is this actually the molecular biochemistry that we have been learning for decades?” [3]

Yet, although there has been much sensationalism about the potential applications of nanotechnology, nanomaterials are up to having a revolutionary impact in several fields of enormous societal relevance.

One example of such disruptive technology is the generation of clean electricity from solar energy with new photovoltaic solar cells that can produce electricity at $0.10 per watt, that is, the price of electricity generated by burning coal, the cheapest fossil fuel still massively used worldwide.

Such an advance relies entirely on the ability of the company to architect and assemble, by fast roll-to-roll printing, nanocrystals of an inorganic material denoted with the acronym CIGS, on a scale in the 1–100 nm range, namely, at the length scale at which the relevant photovoltaic quantum-physics occurs.

Several other advanced nanotechnologies are about to reach the market. Consequently, even if numerous researchers and entrepreneurs abuse the term “nano” to access funding, there will not be a nano bubble – especially after the global financial crisis due to “subprime” loans. When the crisis is over, investors will wisely select technologies and companies in which to invest. And nanotech companies, manufacturing brand new products with new functionalities, will be there to benefit.

Nor shall we commit the same mistakes made with the unregulated use of chemicals in the first half of the twentieth century. The serious questions about the health, environmental, and social impacts of this powerful new technology are being, and will be, dealt with before large-scale commercialization, and nanomaterials will be regulated as new chemicals.

As the economic, social, and environmental problems associated with the sustainability crisis are becoming evident on a global scale, we urgently need advanced technologies that can drastically reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere and, at the same time, increase productivity of the processes we use to manufacture goods and produce the services capable of satisfying the (growing) needs of a global population in rapid growth.

Putting the discussion in this context of crisis and using a critical approach, this book shows how and why nanotechnology holds great promise for addressing these needs. Using plain language and plenty of examples of emerging technologies and innovations, we aim to provide readers with a unified and essential picture of nanotechnology and its impact.

Accordingly, readers of this book may include decision makers at all levels, from managers to politicians, including media professionals and educators. Nanoscale technology innovation will involve virtually every major industry. Hence, all these professionals need to increase their basic knowledge of nanoscale technology, especially of how nano-innovation will transform technologies and markets, and open new growth opportunities in all countries. Finally, the primary aim of this book is to promote action based on such knowledge: what to do and whom to contact to start benefiting from the fruits of nano-innovation.

Palermo, September 2009

Mario Pagliaro

References

1 Ozin, G., Aresenault, A., and Cademartiri, L. (2009) Nanochemistry, RSC Publishing, Cambridge.

2 Berube, D. ( 2006 ) Nano-Hype. The Truth Behind the Nanotechnology Buzz, Prometheus, New York.

3 Yiu, H. ( 2007 ) Defi ning nano . Chemistry World,4, 41–42 ..

About the Author

Mario Pagliaro (b. Palermo, 1969) is a research chemist and management educator based in Palermo at Italy’s CNR, where he leads a research group and Sicily's Photovoltaics Research Pole. His research focuses on the development of functional materials for various uses and operates at the boundaries of chemistry, biology, and materials science.

Prof. Pagliaro is author of ten books, including the scientific bestseller Flexible Solar Cells (Wiley-VCH, 2008), he has co-authored international patents and a large number of scientific papers. In 2009 he chaired the 10th International FIGIPAS Meeting in Inorganic Chemistry in Palermo.

Since 2004 he has organized the prestigious Seminar “Marcello Cara-pezza.” In 2008 he was invited to give the “John van Geuns” Lecture at the University of Amsterdam. In 2005 he was appointed maître de conférencesassocié at the Montpellier Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Chimie.

Between 1998 and 2003 he led the management educational center, Quality College del CNR established a research group that currently collaborates with researchers in ten countries (www.qualitas1998.net).

1

Capturing Sun’s Energy

1.1 Solar Power: Now

Electricity is silent, clean, and easily transported and converted into work. Unsurprisingly, therefore, electric power is the most useful and desirable form of energy available to modern society. Yet, exactly like hydrogen, electricity is an energy and not an energy source. This means that we need to produce electric power by converting primary energy sources into electric power. At present, besides a 16% share from nuclear fission (), we produce electricity mainly by burning hydrocarbons and, sadly, much cheaper coal. For example, still, in 2006 nearly half (49%) of the 4.1 trillion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity generated in the USA used coal as its energy source ().