Page 15 - Science at the nanoscale

1.1. The Development of Nanoscale Science
Schematic of a C 60 buckyball (left) and carbon nanotube
Figure 1.3.
(right).
At around the same time in 1985, Robert Curl, Harold Kroto
and Richard Smalley made the completely unexpected discov-
ery that carbon can also exist in the form of very stable spheres,
5
which they named fullerenes (or buckyballs).
The carbon balls
with chemical formulae C 60 or C 70 are formed when graphite is
evaporated in an inert atmosphere. A new carbon chemistry has
developed from this discovery, and it is now possible to enclose
metal atoms in them, and to create new organic compounds.
Not long after in 1991, Iijima et al. reported Transmission Elec-
tron Microscopy (TEM) observations of hollow graphitic tubes or
carbon nanotubes, which form another member of the fullerene
structural family. 6 The strength and flexibility of carbon nano- 5
tubes makes them potentially useful in many nanotechnology
applications. Carbon nanotubes are now used as composite fibers
in polymers and concrete to improve the mechanical, thermal and
electrical properties of the bulk product. They also have potential
applications as field emitters, energy storage materials, molecu-
lar electronics components, and so on. Some important events
in the historical development of nanoscience and nanotechnology
are summarised in Table 1.1.
5 H. W. Kroto, J. R. Heath, S. C. O’Brien, R. F. Curl and R. E. Smalley, Nature 318,
162 (1985).
6 S. Iijima, Nature 354, 56 (1991).