The 'N' factor
Sandeep Manudhane

Nanotechnology is the magic mantra for the millennium. This field impacts all major sectors, like solar energy, aerospace, environment, telecommunications and computing. Nanotechnology professionals have a broad framework to work in, ranging from science to entertainment.

THE flavour and fragrance industries are worth many billions of dollars and are vital to the appeal and success of many products, ranging from foods to household products to fashion. Critical to these industries is the control and delivery of scents and flavours. Nanoscience and nanotechnology are having profound implications in this area, with some important technologies being derived from research into drug delivery.

"A mobile phone so small that even an ant can use it," goes a commercial that highlights the shift from macro to micro, from micro to nano. Science has become more sophisticated and naturally entered the realm of what is arbitrarily labeled as nanotechnology.

It is a technology that creates small materials on the scale of molecules by manipulating single atoms. The term ‘nano’ comes from the size of molecules measured in nanometers, or one billionth of a metre.

A professor in Tokyo Science University, Norio Taniguchi, coined the term nanotechnology in 1974 to describe the precision manufacture of materials with nanometer.

The synergistic effect of nanotechnology is the magic mantra for the millennium. Its goal is to control individual atoms and molecules to create computer chips and other devices that are a thousand times smaller than what the current technologies permit. Beyond being used in computers, communication and medical-related devices, nanotechnology can be used to design other products, change the properties of materials and make advances in biotechnology.

Nanotechnology professionals work in a broad framework, from fact to fiction or from science to entertainment. This field impacts all major sectors, like solar energy, aerospace, environment, telecommunications, computing and so on.

One can work in the following capacities: systems designer, scientists, academics, biotechnologist, research officer, and product designer. Nanotechnology has been widely used in movies and tele-series like ‘Flies’, ‘Terminator-3’ ‘Star-Trek’, ‘Hulk’, etc and in video games like System Shock Series, Planetside Nanites, Invisible War, etc.

One should have an open and enquiring mind as well as sound analytical and computer programming skills (simulation and algorithm).

Nanotechnology as a Bachelor’s degree course is not offered at any reputed institute in India. The best route to research in nanotechnology is engineering or postgraduation in Physics or Chemistry. The IITs are considering starting a B.Tech in this field. As it is a multi-disciplinary and applied field, an M.Tech in Mechanical, Chemical, Electronic, Biotechnology, Computer Science etc or an M.Sc in Physics, Chemistry, Material Science, Biotechnology, Computer Science etc, qualifies one for the Ph.D programme.

Larry Bock, CEO of Nanosys, who helped launch more than a dozen successful biotech companies in his career, believes that nanotechnology will impact even more industries than biotechnology. "A single chemistry graduate can devise architectures not even imaginable or constructible by today’s biggest microprocessor companies," he says.

Nanotechnoogy is an enabling technology that is being used in many industries. Thus, if one is not doing basic research in one of the many university-based or government-funded research programmes, one could work in a biotech company on a nanoparticle-based molecular system for detecting biological warfare agents or fabricating miniature systems for medical diagnostics.

Opportunities also exist in large pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies where one can work on a new therapeutic drug or a novel drug delivery process.

Engineers from most disciplines will find employment in nanotechnology. Mechanical engineers design, produce and test machines, instruments, controls, engines, and mechanical, thermal or heat transfer systems. By 2020, scientists at Rutgers University believe that nano-sized robots will be injected into the bloodstream to enable them to administer a drug directly to an infected cell. Chemical engineers perform a variety of functions in the field of nanotechnology. These are: synthesis, functionalisms characterisations, and optimisation of materials. They develop non-material assembly processes, create test protocols, and prepare reports. Materials engineers design methods to change natural substances into new, stronger, and more resistant materials with unique properties.

If one is interested in nanotechnology without wanting to be a scientist or an engineer, there are still plenty of opportunities in sales, marketing, business development, legal and administrative areas. Really, nothing is likely to slow the emerging nano-bubble. Whether it’s the atomic energy in the 1950s, space in the 1960s, biotech in the 1980s, or the Internet in the mid-1990s, the world will always be overly excited about any new frontier.

Indian Institutes of Technology: Kanpur, Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Guwahati, Roorkee, and Kharagpur.

Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (www.iisc.ernet.in)

(The list is not exhaustive)