4 ms·

Is it just me or has the term "nanotechnology" really inflated in meaning in recent years. When I think of nanotechnology I think of actual designed automatons

by ginko 13y ago

Is it just me or has the term "nanotechnology" really inflated in meaning in recent years. When I think of nanotechnology I think of actual designed automatons at nano scale, not anything just containing nm sized particles.

chm 13y ago
This is due to politics. If the chief editor of Journal A likes the prefix nano, you'll see nano in the titles. Then journalists read the abstracts, write a story and proliferate the use of the word. This is not _exactly_ how it goes, but you get the point.
geuis 13y ago
Agreed. This is more along the lines of chemistry.
- samatman 13y ago
  A lot of chemistry was alchemically transformed into nanotechnology under the Clinton administration. It's a follow-the-money sort of thing. Turns out, chemists were working in the nano scale all along. Who knew.
  - DLWormwood 13y ago
    > chemistry was alchemically transformed into nanotechnology under the Clinton administration Clever way to put it… although how much was the president’s doing directly, or the consequences of trends within one of the various government agencies that he just rode the wake of, might not be clear without some citation.
Simple1234 13y ago
I think the technology part in this case comes from the fact that it had a real world application, albeit an aesthetic one.
- ChuckMcM 13y ago
  It is entirely unclear if it was purely aesthetic. The article points out that the color changes are extremely sensitive to small changes in ratios of different elements in the containing fluid. It is entirely possible (although I agree it is a stretch) that the color would change if the drink it contain was contaminated with a poison. So what was it? Was it a cool glass that changed color? Or a gift from the Gods that showed the true nature of its contents? If it is as sensitive to change as the article suggests I could see passing it off as the latter. My question then is why I can't get a wine glass today made this way? :-)
  - pbhjpbhj 13y ago
    >why I can't get a wine glass today made this way // How many thousands of dollars do you want to spend?
    - ChuckMcM 13y ago
      Sort of depends on the effectiveness :-) But more seriously looking through my daughters old glaze catalogs there doesn't seem to be a glaze with a mix of gold and silver particulates, much less one with "exact proportions" hinted at in the article. Given the effect of being different colors when different types of liquids were in the cup seems so novel, I found that surprising. I have no idea if I can write to the glazing company and ask them to mix me up a special glaze, but if it recreated this effect I am sure it would be popular with folks.
      - pbhjpbhj 13y ago
        I think it may be because gold and silver melt too close to the temperature at which glazes are usually designed to flow. For gold the melting point is ~ 1060 deg C (Earthenware firing temperatures). I'd expect the gold might tend to coalesce rather than maintaining the sizes required to produce the effect in the OP. Also I don't know about applying glazes to glass, only ceramics.
  - DLWormwood 13y ago
sliverstorm 13y ago
If "containing nm sized particles" is all something needs to do to be considered nanotechnology, everything is nanotechnology. This is getting ridiculous.
- pbhjpbhj 13y ago
  Then what would you call [purposefully] generating nano sized particles and mixing them in a specific ratio to add to glass to create a colour change effect that is highly sensitive to contaminants? It's not simply chemistry as it's using [apparently] engineered physical effects of light transmittance.
  - sliverstorm 13y ago
    I'd call it either chemistry or applied physics. Probably lean more towards applied physics, as chemistry doesn't concern itself with light. I mean, in what way is this engineering? Metal particles emit characteristic glows when struck by light. Romans ground up the metal and mixed it in with glass. Now the glass does it too. Voilà. If I'm reading the article right, this is analogous to me making lemonade by mixing sugar and lemon juice into water, granting the water the flavors of sugar and lemon with nanometer-scale particles (citric acid and sucrose). Is lemonade now the tastiest form of nanotechnology?
    - andrewSC 13y ago
      Yes, yes it is.
    - cosmie 13y ago
      It may seem like commonly known applied physics today, but you can bet 1600 years ago it was a pretty amazing engineering fete to create a glass that automatically changed colors when different liquids were put in it. 1600 years from now I'm sure our successors will be calling the quantum computers we're toying with simple applied physics instead of engineering as well.
      - 13y ago
sungx105 13y ago
But despite appearing primarily in popular culture as extremely small robots, nanotechnology simply refers to the scale of the technology, so actually, this is by definition, nanotechnology. It is actually the popular representation of nanotechnology which has always been too specific.
- Dylan16807 13y ago
  That's what 'nano' means, but 'nanotechnology' is a set phrase with a specific meaning. You have to be manipulating matter at that scale, not simply using particles that size. Smoke is not nanotechnology.
  - sliverstorm 13y ago
    Smoke is not nanotechnology Well, there goes my proposal for an ingenious plan to apply nanotechnology to the field of communications. I was thinking of calling them "smoke signals". it was even going to be in the cloud...s
foysavas 13y ago
Sadly, I've read pieces where obsidian blades are labeled as nanotech as well. In other news, cranberry glass is actually kind of cool and helped win this guy a Nobel Prize in 1925: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Adolf_Zsigmondy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Adolf_Zsigmondy

by ginko 13y ago

chm 13y ago

This is due to politics. If the chief editor of Journal A likes the prefix nano, you'll see nano in the titles. Then journalists read the abstracts, write a story and proliferate the use of the word. This is not _exactly_ how it goes, but you get the point.

geuis 13y ago

Agreed. This is more along the lines of chemistry.

samatman 13y ago
A lot of chemistry was alchemically transformed into nanotechnology under the Clinton administration. It's a follow-the-money sort of thing. Turns out, chemists were working in the nano scale all along. Who knew.
- DLWormwood 13y ago
  > chemistry was alchemically transformed into nanotechnology under the Clinton administration Clever way to put it… although how much was the president’s doing directly, or the consequences of trends within one of the various government agencies that he just rode the wake of, might not be clear without some citation.

Simple1234 13y ago

I think the technology part in this case comes from the fact that it had a real world application, albeit an aesthetic one.

ChuckMcM 13y ago
It is entirely unclear if it was purely aesthetic. The article points out that the color changes are extremely sensitive to small changes in ratios of different elements in the containing fluid. It is entirely possible (although I agree it is a stretch) that the color would change if the drink it contain was contaminated with a poison. So what was it? Was it a cool glass that changed color? Or a gift from the Gods that showed the true nature of its contents? If it is as sensitive to change as the article suggests I could see passing it off as the latter. My question then is why I can't get a wine glass today made this way? :-)
- pbhjpbhj 13y ago
  >why I can't get a wine glass today made this way // How many thousands of dollars do you want to spend?
  - ChuckMcM 13y ago
    Sort of depends on the effectiveness :-) But more seriously looking through my daughters old glaze catalogs there doesn't seem to be a glaze with a mix of gold and silver particulates, much less one with "exact proportions" hinted at in the article. Given the effect of being different colors when different types of liquids were in the cup seems so novel, I found that surprising. I have no idea if I can write to the glazing company and ask them to mix me up a special glaze, but if it recreated this effect I am sure it would be popular with folks.
    - pbhjpbhj 13y ago
      I think it may be because gold and silver melt too close to the temperature at which glazes are usually designed to flow. For gold the melting point is ~ 1060 deg C (Earthenware firing temperatures). I'd expect the gold might tend to coalesce rather than maintaining the sizes required to produce the effect in the OP. Also I don't know about applying glazes to glass, only ceramics.
- DLWormwood 13y ago

sliverstorm 13y ago

If "containing nm sized particles" is all something needs to do to be considered nanotechnology, everything is nanotechnology. This is getting ridiculous.

pbhjpbhj 13y ago
Then what would you call [purposefully] generating nano sized particles and mixing them in a specific ratio to add to glass to create a colour change effect that is highly sensitive to contaminants? It's not simply chemistry as it's using [apparently] engineered physical effects of light transmittance.
- sliverstorm 13y ago
  I'd call it either chemistry or applied physics. Probably lean more towards applied physics, as chemistry doesn't concern itself with light. I mean, in what way is this engineering? Metal particles emit characteristic glows when struck by light. Romans ground up the metal and mixed it in with glass. Now the glass does it too. Voilà. If I'm reading the article right, this is analogous to me making lemonade by mixing sugar and lemon juice into water, granting the water the flavors of sugar and lemon with nanometer-scale particles (citric acid and sucrose). Is lemonade now the tastiest form of nanotechnology?
  - andrewSC 13y ago
    Yes, yes it is.
  - cosmie 13y ago
    It may seem like commonly known applied physics today, but you can bet 1600 years ago it was a pretty amazing engineering fete to create a glass that automatically changed colors when different liquids were put in it. 1600 years from now I'm sure our successors will be calling the quantum computers we're toying with simple applied physics instead of engineering as well.
    - 13y ago

sungx105 13y ago

But despite appearing primarily in popular culture as extremely small robots, nanotechnology simply refers to the scale of the technology, so actually, this is by definition, nanotechnology. It is actually the popular representation of nanotechnology which has always been too specific.

Dylan16807 13y ago
That's what 'nano' means, but 'nanotechnology' is a set phrase with a specific meaning. You have to be manipulating matter at that scale, not simply using particles that size. Smoke is not nanotechnology.
- sliverstorm 13y ago
  Smoke is not nanotechnology Well, there goes my proposal for an ingenious plan to apply nanotechnology to the field of communications. I was thinking of calling them "smoke signals". it was even going to be in the cloud...s

foysavas 13y ago

Sadly, I've read pieces where obsidian blades are labeled as nanotech as well. In other news, cranberry glass is actually kind of cool and helped win this guy a Nobel Prize in 1925: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Adolf_Zsigmondy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Adolf_Zsigmondy