Introduction:

Fascinating innovations are often bought into real life from an imaginary world.

And nanotechnology is one of the technologies that have the potential to create mind-blowing real-time inventions that are inspired by imagination.

By leveraging nanotechnology one can create teensy-weensy robots that enter into the bloodstream and fight with any kind of dreadful disease. this incredible technology doesn’t limit itself to one specific branch as it started influencing various branches of science and technology by playing a significant role.

Scientists are head over hell on this revolutionary technology As this fast-growing technology kept on going by multiplying its market value.

In 2017 the market value was estimated as 49 billion U.S. dollars globally, and the booming technology took a fast track and increased to 76 billion U.S. dollars by 2020.

In this article, we are going to connect all the dots by exploring the branches and industries that are under the influence of nanotechnology. We are also going to dig a little deeper by understanding the significance of nanotech and applications that changed the real world over the past decade.  

Branches of nanotechnology:

By considering, multiple fields that are connected to Nanotechnology, it is simply divided into two main branches. These two branches are generalized as they relate various fields to nanotechnology.

1. Green nanotechnology
2. Nanoengineering

Green nanotechnology:

Scientists landed the idea of using this fast-growing technology in replacing toxic products with eco-friendly products, Nanotechnology comes into play by giving a form to this incredible idea.

The products are produced by using nanotechnology and this technology is also called “clean technology” which resembles the main idea of this technology.

 The two main goals of green nanotechnology are:

1. To produce nanotech products that don’t cause any kind of damage to the environment and humankind.

2.Secondly, To create products that improve environmental sustainability and replace harmful polluted products.

This green nanotechnology has many sub-branches as every product that is produced with nanotechnology by aiming at environmental sustainability comes under green technology.

Applications and Current research:

Though there are many sub-branches and applications to green technology, there is some work under the process that can add great value to our everyday life. some of them are as follows.

1.nanoremediatation and water treatment

Nanomaterials have the capability of treating water surfaces by eliminating the metal ions and toxic substances and this astonishing capability piqued the curiosity of many researchers as they started to explore this particular feature by cleansing and purifying contaminated water sites. The research is still going on as the reachers are coming up with some amazing results.

RO, Nanofiltration, and ultrafiltration are some current existing nanotechnology water treatments.

But researchers believe that nanotechnology has the power of eliminating dangerous viruses and bacteria and the research is going on hoping for some great results.

2.cleaning up oil spills

According to the U.S Environmental protection agency, More than 10 thousand oil spills are found every year.

Even though the traditional method helped in clearing out the oil spill they failed terribly in retrieving the oil from the oil spills. However, nanowires changed the whole game as they not only clear spills much faster but they also effectively recover the oil, and the best part about nanowires is they are reusable.

Nanoengineering:

Nanoengineering is the other branch of nanotechnology that works on the nanoscale. This branch deals with designs, mechanics, building, and the use of engines.

Simply put, this branch deals with engineering nanoproducts for different fields.

It produces products for  many industries like medical, engineering and IT, etc. nanotechnology also has its relevant fields where nanotechnology serves as the main factor they are nanoelectronics, nanophotonics, nanomechanics, nanobiotechnology, etc

Applications and Current research:

There are multiple applications as this combines all the various fields but here is one of the interesting innovations that are in trend.

Even though the term engineering means working on aspects like design and mechanics nanoengineering explores the nanoscale material to plan and create gadgets and frameworks that are new and have great capacities.

This feature led to the latest innovation of 3d printing, one of the evolving applications of nanotechnology.

1. 3d printing:

Nanotechnology added a ton of value to  3d printing in recent times as it gave proven results in less period and brought many epic changes that level up the whole 3d game.

Nanotechnology eliminated the human operator in the whole process of material and device assembling which accelerated the process and decreased the rate of wastage production.

Two-photon lithography is one of the latest techniques where 3d printing is done by using nanotech in this process laser cured resin will absorb two photons at once. This is only possible if the laser has good intensity and this helps in achieving great results as we can form castles on the tip of the pencil.

Recently a team of researchers from Vienna combined this technique with biocompatible resin to support scaffolds for living cells.

2.The nanoengineering is used to design and produce products for many other industries like electronics, medicine, etc.

Contributing fields of nanotechnology:

●    Nanoelectronics:

Nanoelectronic specifies the significance of nanotechnology in electronics and  When it comes to electrons the main goal of nanotechnology is improving the storage, conversion rate, and decreasing the material and process rates.

This branch also involves an extensive study of interatomic interactions and quantum mechanical properties to produce tiny electronic devices.

Applications and Current research:

1.energy production-Solar cell

Scientists are working on creating solar cells and batteries that are both eco-friendly and long-lasting.

This can be achieved with advanced nanotechnology, the researchers are working on this idea by using nanostructures like nanowires and some more nanostructures to produce a highly functional yet cheaper solar cell.

2.computers

With time the power of a computer processor is increasing and this development in the field of electronics came into life because of advanced nanotechnology.

This involves a process called semiconductor fabrication techniques. The researcher is working on this process to come up with some better approaches which include nanolithography.

New nanomaterials like nanowires are used to replace the CMOS components and the field-effect transistors are produced by using carbon nanotubes to reduce the size and increase the efficiency.

●    Nanophotonics

Nanophotonics is considered as a sub-branch of optical engineering, nanotechnology, and electrical engineering.it is defined as the study of the behavior of light on the nanoscale.

This study majorly deals with satisfying and supporting the needs of products that are produced in both electronic and biochemistry.

Applications and Current research:

Recently, the University of Sydney started working on is new optical processing technology based on nanophotonics this project is monitored by CUDOS ARC Central of excellence, the main goal of this research is to come up with a photonic chip that helps in setting the entire optical network onto a chip which in the size of a thumbnail. this helps in improving the power of semiconductors and can be efficiently used in smart devices.

It is said that with the existing technology we can build circuits with silicon that supports photonics.

Photonic chips or photonic integrated circuits are widely used in different applications like spanning communications, computing, defense and security, medicine, and sensing.

●    Nanomechanics

Nanomechanics is considered as one of the branches in nanoscience.it deals with studying mechanics like elastic, thermal, kinetic on the nanoscale.

In recent times, nanomaterials are grabbing great attention with their unique properties and this is exactly when nanomechanics are used with full potential to explore the properties of these nanomaterials.

Nanomechanics produces a platform to experiment with nanotechnology in various fields as it works on miniaturizing the existing devices from computing to biology.

Applications and Current research:

Out hundreds of amazing applications of this study, here are some of the unique and recent application that interests you

1. polymer dynamic properties is now measured with nanomechanics

The viscoelastic properties of polymers should be known to control the application that tends to vibrate. Nanomechanics, Inc came up with a dynamic module of polymers by applying a frequency.

By stepping further we can avoid the traditional DMA test equipment as the testing doesn’t need any large volumes and particular geometries.

2.Fracture toughness of brittle material can be found

Fracture toughness is defined as the mechanical property that tells about the resistance to crack growth in a brittle material.

However, the ways to measure this property has always been time-consuming and costly because of sample preparation. but replacing the traditional method by indentation testing with cube cone indenter geometry helps in improving the measurement fracture and gives swift results and immense data which intensifies the statistics

 Nanobiotechnology

Nanobiotechnology is referred to as the usage of nanotechnology in the field of biology to enhance the results. In this particular study, nanotechnology acts like a tool that fulfills the impossible goals by creating nanodevices.

With this technology, one can create new medicine, new materials, and new devices that can bring a huge change in the world of biology

Applications and Current researches:

The applications of nanobiotechnology are highly seen in the field of medicine as it is involved in every single step from the detection of disease to drug delivery. thought there are many applications in nanobiotechnology, we are going to see how this study established an incredible way in detection, gene delivery, and drug delivery process

Detection

Detection of any kind of disease starts with recognizing the antibodies usually this is done by conjugating the antibodies with dyes and finding the signals in the given samples by microscopy.

However, this traditional method fails in specificity and practicality. this problem is solved by nanotechnology by introducing “quantum dots” these tiny probes can cope up with the excitations and light emissions and helps in giving better accurate results.

GENE DELIVERY

The pharmaceutical process and development are one of the biggest obstacles in gene therapy. to overcome this dilemma nanotechnology tools are used in human gene therapy  which leads to a successful repairing and replacing genes in human by showing less immunogenic nanosize gene carriers as a substitution of the disputed viral vectors 

Drug Delivery

When it comes to drug delivery reaching the target site effectively plays a major role but traditional drugs cannot reach out to specific places. This problem is solved by nanoparticles as they can reach out to locations that are impossible these nanoparticles are guided to locations through magnetic signals after attaching drugs chemically.

Nano drugs also help in reducing the Side effects of the medication by taking control of the dosage needed for the patient.

Conclusion:

Irrespective of these branches there are several fields like food, agriculture, handlooms that got great benefits with nanotechnology as nanotechnology tied many loss ends up by adding value and a great benefit to the existing technology.

The future scope of every single field involved in nanotechnology is taking a bigger step by aiming for revolutionary changes that improve the quality of human lives.

Sources:

https://www.nano.gov/you/nanotechnology-benefits

https://www.iberdrola.com/innovation/nanotechnology-applications