Review | Sundayobserver.lk

“We have scientists with the most up to date knowledge and it should be used more efficiently,” Professor K.M. Nalin de Silva , a renowned research scientist in nanotechnology, said elaborating on the Sri Lankan potentials in Nanotechnology in an interview with the Sunday Observer. As Professor de Silva says there are many paths which we can take. Water purification, developing solar energy, advancements in textile industry are few to mention. Following are the excerpts of the interview.

A: In general terms its manipulating things at nano scale. One nanometer (nm) is one billionth, or 10-9, of a meter.

It mostly deals in the range 0 - 100 nm. Creating of useful functional material, devices or systems through the control of water at nano meter scale. Nature creates things at nano scale. It’s the best nano scale manufacturer.

A: The technology is more concerned on `Bottom up’ approach rather than the traditional `Top down’ approach in manufacturing. Since the early days of civilization, we humans were making our tools and accessories using big chunks of material. It has more wastage and several other negative impacts thus not giving the exact desired product. With the emerge of the nanotechnology concept, the `bottom up’ method became highlighted.

A: It’s manufacturing products from the smallest possible building block, i.e. for material it’s the atom. Atoms are measured in the Anstrom scale which is 10-10 scale. Which is obviously smaller than the nano scale. So for a molecular scientist there is lot of space to create and manipulate. Thus the molecular engineering has a major contribution in these methods. In this way, scientists have found less wastage of material, properties becoming totally different from the normal with amazing results. When you start structuring a material from molecular level it can change its physical, chemical, electrical and many other different properties. For example if we are to produce a non-conducting material using this method in nanotechnology it can show conducting properties, which is extraordinary.

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs), the cylindrical carbon moleculeshave novel properties that make them potentially useful in many applications in nanotechnology, electronics, optics and other fields of materials science, as well as potential uses in architectural fields. They exhibit extraordinary strength and unique electrical properties, and are efficient conductors of heat. Nanotubes are members of the fullerene structural family, which also includes the spherical buckyballs. The ends of a nanotube might be capped with a hemisphere of the buckyball structure. Their name is derived from their size, since the diameter of a nanotube is on the order of a few nanometers (approximately 1/50,000th of the width of a human hair), while they can be up to several millimeters in length. Nanotubes are categorized as single-walled nanotubes (SWNTs) and multi-walled nanotubes(MWNTs).

In Gold, its original colour is different when the molecules are produced using this `bottom up’ approach. Instead of gold it gives red, orange, blue coloured spectrum. It is not gold!

A: In the macroscopic world most atoms are inside a material. But when getting smaller in size more area gets exposed to the environment thus having more atoms on the surface.

This will change the physical, optical, chemical, magnetic, mechanical and electrical properties change vastly.

This possibility can be beneficial when it comes to innovative concepts. Amazingly, there is evidence in historical artifacts to say that our ancestors knew this.

A group of scientists from the Queensland University have found the colours, especially the gold, on the stained glasses of the windows of the 500 years old Kings College cathedral in the Cambridge University is nano gold particles and not organic dyes.

A: There are many issues in the world at the moment which only has temporary answers. We need clean and cheap energy. There is an increased demand for pure drinking water, need to reduce environment pollution and the need to address world hunger. There can be marvelous changes in the field of medicine with innovative drug delivery systems. The apparel technology can be changed with these innovations in the nanotechnology world. The world is facing a huge energy crisis and the most reliable energy for us on earth is the sun. Even the most up to date solar panels uses only a low percentage of this energy. With nanotechnology we can create specific nanomaterial that consumes less energy and transfer solar power more efficiently. Scientists are experimenting to create conducting polymers to create dye sensitized solar cells. I conducted one such experiment at the University of Colombo since we being in a tropical country attention towards the sun as an alternative energy is more practical. Who knows one day we can just paint the roofing sheets with dyes made out of these conducting polymers and use sun’s energy! In the world scientists are trying to create a catalyst to break water using sunlight to produce hydrogen and oxygen. Nanofilters can be created to totally filter water. Fertilizer can be created that the farmer can effectively use for his crops. The benefit from nanotechnology to the world is immense.

A: We may not be able to compete with world’s giants. But definitely there are many paths which we can take. One is water purification methods. We can focus on creating nanofilters to produce clean drinking water without heating the water to boiling level which consumes lot of energy. Almost all the microbes are in micrometer range which is smaller than nano meter scale. Hence this is very much reliable and efficient than boiling water. At the moment I am conducting an experiment in creating nanofilters and we are experimenting its practical usage and practical possibilities of mass scale production with industries. And Dr. Rohini de Silva, Chemistry Department, University of Colombo is conducting experiments on drug delivery systems using nano particles, especially treating cancer. In these methods are experimented to deliver the drug specifically to the target using nano particles. Another field would be the textile industry. Scientists in the world have found certain materials, such as Titanium (Ti), when used under this nanotechnology will show characteristics destroying organic material on clothes. Dirt is an organic material. When kept under the sun it destroys this dirt, hence water and soap is not needed. For industries and services, where mass scale washing take place this can bring marvelous changes. We have a potential in this new concept.

Q: What are the Sri Lankan initiatives to bring this technology to the country?

A: Under the National Science Foundation, the national science body under the Ministry of Science and Technology, have formed a National Nanotechnology Committee. With the initiations of the NSF we were able to set up SLINTEC (Sri Lanka Institute of Nanotechnology) in collaboration with five main companies of the country. We have already set up a modern highly up to date laboratory with this project and it’s almost in completion. With this our scientists don’t have to spend large amounts of money to carry out experiments in universities abroad.

A: It all depends on how we progress. Even if we can’t compete there is a part which we can play for the betterment of the country. That is what is important at the moment.

At present we must focus on conducting nanotechnology research in collaboration with the industries addressing their problems and innovations to develop these industries. We have scientists with the most up to date knowledge and it should be used more efficiently.

(Prof. K. M. Nalin de Silva is a leading researcher in the Nanotechnology field attached to the Chemistry Department of the University of Colombo. He also serves as a member of the Sub Committee on National Nanotechnology Policy of the National Nanotechnology Committee)

Nanotech in 1959

The first use of the concepts in nano-technology was in “There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom, “a talk given by physicist Richard Feynman at an American Physical Society meeting at Caltech way back in 1959 on December 29. Feynman described a process by which the ability to manipulate individual atoms and molecules might be developed, using one set of precise tools to build and operate another proportionally smaller set, so on down to the needed scale.

In the course of this, he noted, scaling issues would arise from the changing magnitude of various physical phenomena: gravity would become less important, surface tension and Van der Waals attraction would become more important, etc. This basic idea appears plausible, and exponential assembly enhances it with parallelism to produce a useful quantity of end products.

The term “nanotechnology” was defined by Tokyo Science University Professor Norio Taniguchi in a 1974 paper as follows: “`Nano-technology’ mainly consists of the processing of, separation, consolidation, and deformation of materials by one atom or by one molecule.” Nanotechnology and nanoscience got started in the early 1980s with two major developments; the birth of cluster science and the invention of the scanning tunnelling microscope (STM). This development led to the discovery of fullerenes in 1986 and carbon nanotubes a few years later. In another development, the synthesis and properties of semiconductor nanocrystals was studied; This led to a fast increasing number of metal oxide nanoparticles of quantum dots. The atomic force microscope was invented six years after the STM was invented.

Initiative for effectively sharing spatial data

A facility for effective and economic sharing of spatial data among stakeholder agencies of interest is getting into shape at the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Modern Technologies (ACCMT).

“The concept received much welcome from the stakeholders and at the moment we are carrying out the planning of this tedious effort,” Vidya Jothi Prof. K.K.Y.W. Perera, Chairman of the ACCMT told the `Sunday Observer’.

The potential of Remote Sensing and other Space Technology related applications in enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of the activities in a diverse range of fields, such as natural resource management, irrigation, agriculture, land, weather, disaster management, urban infrastructure and fisheries, etc., is being increasingly realized by the organizations operating in such fields. While certain national agencies in Sri Lanka are operating in some of these fields are making substantial use of remote sensing data in their organizational activities. Certain others are planning or at the experimental phase of deploying of such technologies. “The Arthur C. Clarke Centre for Modern Technologies do own the infrastructure facilities and we do need to advance them. We will be able to set up this facility in collaboration with foreign assistance of a country that possess highly developed state-of-the-Art Technological capabilities in remote sensing and related technologies,” Director and CEO of the ACCMT Sanath Panawennage said.

Through the respective Ministries and Ministry of Science and Technology, the inter agency collaborative framework proposed to be established among own Governmental agencies will bring many other benefits facilitating the development of technical capabilities of the country. This would help to avoid duplication of costs for hardware, software and human resources required and obtaining a broader technological consultancies at a lower cost would be another possibility.

“In the long run, we are capable of developing software for interpreting and using Remote Sensing Data in accordance with the specific local requirements of the agencies,” Panawennage added.

This step would enhance the chances for faster diffusion of the technology among as well as within the oraganisations.

In addition, the effort would result in the initial stages the evolution of a National Spatial Data Infrastructure.

Biology Olympiad 2009

Sri Lankan students can now compete and win medals in Sri Lankan Biology Olympiad 2009. Four students will also be selected to participate in International Biology Olympiad in 2010 in South Korea. Students sitting for the local or the London A/L exams in 2009 or in 2010 are eligible to apply. Application forms can be downloaded from http://www.iobsl.org website.

Gold, Silver or Bronze medals will be awarded to selected candidates based on their performance. Deadline for submission of applications is April 30. The examination to select the winners will be conducted on Sunday, June 28 at Universities of Colombo, Batticaloa, Jaffna, Kelaniya. Peradeniya, Ruhuna and Sri Jayewardenepura

SCI-TECH

Nanotechnology

Initiative for effectively sharing spatial data

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Biology Olympiad 2009