Nanotechnology is the buzzword in the scientific world at the moment. It is expected to be the next growth area after information technology and biotechnology. In Finland heavy investment is being made into multidisciplinary research in the field. A Professorship of Nanoscience has just been set up at Jyväskylä University, and the first Finnish nanoproduct is already on the market.

Nanotechnology is the technology of minuteness: a nano prefix means that the objects under examination are structures whose size is calculated in billions of parts of a metre i.e. nanometres. One nanometre is about 1/80,000 of the thickness of a human hair.

The revolutionary nature of nanotechnology lies hidden in the fact that it enables materials to be constructed and worked atom by atom, molecule by molecule. These nanostructures offer in principle countless opportunities to develop the desired physical and chemical properties for materials. The result is much smaller, effective and intelligent equipment than previously.

Nanotechnology stretches out far and wide

Nanotechnology is a genuinely multidisciplinary field for research. Chemists, biologists, physicists and information technology experts examine the same phenomena from their own perspectives. There is taking place in Finland at the moment a broad-based nanochemistry cooperation project that is uniting six groups of specialists from the universities at Helsinki and Jyväskylä, Åbo Academy University at Turku, and from the universities of technology at Tampere and Helsinki. All the participants cooperate with European and Japanese universities.

Finland's first Professorship in Nanoscience was established at the University of Jyväskylä at the beginning of August. The nanoscience unit there was created alongside the departments of chemistry, physics and bio and environmental sciences, which were already well-known for their nano expertise. The Technical Research Centre of Finland, the Academy of Finland and the National Technology Agency have nanoprojects under way in various fields.

At this moment nanotechnology is mainly in the basic research stage, but in the future - maybe ten years' time - it might be possible to see equipment that uses nanotechnology on shop shelves. The possible applications are countless: from electronic 'noses' to intelligent materials that react to light, heat and chemicals in a desired manner, and from much smaller and efficient memory chips in computers to spaceships made from ultra-light material.

Corporate research as well

The nanotechnology research that is concentrated around Jyväskylä University has already spawned its first product and company. Nanoway Oy, which up till now has been a small company, has developed a nanothermometer that measures very low temperatures near absolute zero. This ultra-accurate thermometer for extreme conditions, which is much smaller than a pinhead, is suited to cold laboratories on the ground, and in space to environment satellites' detectors that are sensitive to the temperature. So far dozens of these thermometers, which cost about 10,000 euros, have been delivered to customers.

>> www.nanoway.fi
>> www.jyu.fi
>> www.vtt.fi
>> www.aka.fi
>> www.tekes.fi

The ultra-modern room at the Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT) creates a good framework for research on the nano scale as well.
Photo: VTT Centre for Microelectronics