“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

IBM’s nanotechnology research aims to devise new atomic- and molecular-scale structures and devices for enhancing information technologies, as well as discover and understand their scientific foundations. Leading the development of nanotechnology, IBM’s scientists have made numerous breakthroughs in the study of these nano-scale technologies. In particular, carbon nanotubes and scanning probes derived from the atomic force microscope — cousin of the scanning tunneling microscope — show particular promise in enabling dramatically improved circuits and data storage devices. Research on nanoparticles leads to applications in biomedicine as well as hard disk drive storage. Photonic bandgap materials — on-chip nanoscale structures the size of a wavelength of light — will manipulate light as optical waveguides, splitters and routers. Research into nanomechanical information storage, such as IBM’s Millipede project, continues to increase the possibilities for increased areal storage density.
nanotechnologyIBM’s research into nano-scale structures that self-assemble may one day obviate the need to “hand-position” atoms. Nanotechnology will allow the design and control of the structure of an object on all length scales, from the atomic to the macroscopic enabling more efficient and vastly less expensive manufacturing processes and providing the hardware foundation for future information technology