WHAT IS NANOTECH?
Enter the invisible world of tiny machines and materials, where everything measures 0.0001 millimetres or less
WORDS LAURA MEARS
DID YOU KNOW? Researchers are designing salt-based nanoparticles that make clouds form in the sky
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The smallest object visible to the naked eye is a human egg cell. It measures just 0.1 millimetres in length. Beyond that limit, the world is completely invisible. Nanotechnology is the field of science and engineering at a scale of one to a hundred nanometres. That’s a thousand to a hundred thousand times smaller than the smallest thing we can see.
Particles at this tiny scale behave completely differently to the full-size structures we are used to. Gold changes colour from yellow to purple and becomes liquid at room temperature. Carbon transforms into an extraordinary electrical conductor. And copper gains the ability to kill bacteria. Discovering this invisible world and harnessing its power is the domain of nanotechnology.