a blog by the NSF Center for Sustainable Nanotechnology
co-written by Claire Alford People love to categorize themselves by personality type, whether it’s describing what kind of baked potato we are, or which character we have most in common with from Stranger Things. But have you ever wondered what kind of nanoparticle you would be? We thought it would be fun to create a …
Continue reading "What Nanoparticle Are You? Take Our Quiz to Find Out!"
The term “terrorism” is becoming quite ubiquitous in our everyday lives. It seems that you can hardly watch a news report, browse the internet, listen to a podcast, or tune into your favorite radio station without being made aware of the most recent terrorist attack that has happened here or abroad. The prevalence of these …
We talk a lot about nanoparticles, which are nano-sized and nearly spherical. But, the shapes accessible in the nano-world are plentiful! For example, I recently made these! (click for larger images... DO IT!) I like to call them “nano-Koosh-balls,” because of how closely they resemble the children’s toy of the same name. These nano-Koosh-balls are …
Continue reading "Nano-Koosh-balls: What They’re Good For and How I Made Them."
For many people the celebration of the 4th of July is not totally complete without a good aerial fireworks show. A good firework show needs to have two essential components to deliver that thrilling experience most of us love to see—sound and color effects. Nanotechnology could make it possible for these fireworks effects to be …
Continue reading "Nanomaterials Making Their Way into Fireworks"
To me, one of the most interesting aspects of nanotechnology is how close in size the nanoparticles we can make are to the nano-sized components of living organisms. These nano sized proteins, lipids and nucleic acids have evolved to form the network of biological machines to support the abundance of life on this planet. Just as …
Continue reading "Nature’s Nanomachines Harnessed to Enable Healthier Delicious Ice Cream"
Beer. It’s one of humanity’s finest inventions and is the topic of several blogs on its own. There is a lot that beer can teach us. For example, recently a group of hard working scientists invented a new way to brew batches of nanoparticles that is reminiscent of beer brewing. For those of you not …
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You’re looking at an electron micrograph of gold nanoparticles; a snap shot of tiny gold crystals that are 1/10,000th the diameter of a human hair. Nanoparticles just these like may soon transform every aspect of our day to day lives, from the size of our personal electronic devices to the way diagnose and treat cancer; …
Continue reading "Nanoparticles Are All Around Us"
Today we’ve got some important things to talk about. I’m not talking about the how or why we’re here on this planet, or settling the great cake vs. pie debate (because clearly pie is the correct choice). No, today we’re thinking big thoughts on small things. First things first though. Gone are the days when …
Continue reading "“Why all the nano-hype?” or “Do nanoparticles fall in love?”"
Now that you’ve somehow gotten to this blog, you’re probably wondering, “Where am I? What is this ‘Center for Sustainable Nanotechnology’?” Our “center” is actually a group of people who care about our environment and are doing collaborative research to help ensure that our planet will be habitable hundreds of years from now – in …
Sustainable Nano 