CURRENT APPLICATIONS:Nanocomposites – materials created through the introduction of nanoparticulates into a macroscopic sample material for the purposes of introducing thermal and electrical conductivity and/or to increase the strength of the material.
Nanocrystals – nanoparticles with a crystalline structure ideal for harvesting light energy in photovoltaic devices.
Nanoparticles – microscopic particles used in the creation of common items as stain-proof fabrics, sunscreens, paints, and synthetic bone.
Nanotubes – nanometer scale wire-like material typically composed of Carbon.
Nanorobots – nano-scale machines programmed to perform specific tasks. Nanorobots may one day peform the functions of antibodies and cellular repair
fabrication technique:A new fabrication technique, known as soft interference lithography (SIL), makes it possible to inexpensively produce large sheets of gold films with virtually infinite arrays of perforations and microscale "patches" of nanoscale holes. A combination of interference lithography and soft lithography, SIL offers many significant advantages over existing techniques. It can be used to scale-up the nanomanufacturing process to produce plasmonic metamaterials and devices in large quantities. Devices such as films of nanoholes can also serve as templates to make their inverse structures, such as nanoparticles. (Legend: Si=silicon; Cr=chromium; PEEL=a fabrication procedure Odom and her colleagues developed to make free standing films.)