“Nanotechnology is an area which has highly promising prospects for turning fundamental research into successful innovations. Not only to boost the competitiveness of our industry but also to create new products that will make positive changes in the lives of our citizens, be it in medicine, environment, electronics or any other field.”
(European Commissioner for Science & Research, Janez Poto?nik)
Nanotechnology comprises technological developments on the nanometer scale, usually 0.1 to 100 nm (1/1,000 ?m, or 1/1,000,000 mm). A possible way to interpret this size is to take the width of a hair, and imagine something ten thousand times smaller. The term has sometimes been applied to microscopic technology.
Nanotechnology is any technology which exploits phenomena and structures that can only occur at the nanometer scale, which is the scale of several atoms and small molecules. The United States’ National Nanotechnology Initiative website defines it as follows: “Nanotechnology is the understanding and control of matter at dimensions of roughly 1 to 100 nanometers, where unique phenomena enable novel applications.” Such phenomena include quantum confinement–which can result in different electromagnetic and optical properties of a material between nanoparticles and the bulk material; the Gibbs-Thomson effect–which is the lowering of the melting point of a material when it is nanometers in size; and such structures as carbon nanotubes.
Source: wikipedia.org