Chapter 1 NANOTECHNOLOGY Nanotechnology is the science of very small things Everything in the world from the hair on a person's head to the plastic in a lunch tray is made up of tiny parts These parts are called molecules LO Everything you see here including lunch trays food and people is made up of molecules What are molecules made up
Molecules are made up of even smaller parts called atoms Atoms are so small they can only be seen with a powerful microscope Things around the size of molecules and atoms are called nanomaterials They range from 1 to 100 nanometers in size Because atoms and molecules are so difficult to see people often use models when learning about
How Small Is a Nanometer It s hard to imagine how small a nanometer is It is one billionth of a meter A human hair is about 100 000 nanometers wide Each page in this book is about 100 000 nanometers thick This image of human hair was taken with a powerful
A nanomaterial may be 1 to 100 nanometers wide in one direction It may be much larger in another direction One example of this is the carbon nanotube This nanomaterial is made up of carbon atoms They are assembled into a tube shape The tube may be 1 nanometer or less wide but millions of nanometers long This illustration of a carbon nanotube shows individual carbon atoms as black
