Cavendish Kinetics is a fabless semi-conductor company founded in 1994 in Holland. As a fabless company, Cavendish simply designs its products and outsources the physical production of those products. Since 1994, the company has been developing embedded non-volatile memory solutions. The company’s core technology, Nanomech, is the product of extensive research at the University of Cambridge Cavendish Laboratories. Cavendish’s patented Nanomech technology is a process module that supports various types of non-volatile memory. Cavendish advertises the module as a breakthrough innovation that is highly flexible and adaptable to the individual client’s needs. Specifically, Nanomech is sold as a complete IP package with seamless integration into a chosen CMOS facility. Because the module uses standarad CMOS technology, no new investment in equipment or materials is necessary on the part of the client. Nanomech also operates on ultra low-power, just 25 PicoJoules, enabling it to operate on native voltage without any conversion. However, the module is programmable to operate on higher voltages should the need arise. Additionally, Nanomech is designed to operate efficiently in extremely harsh conditions. So far the module has proven itself capable of operating normally in 200+ degrees centigrade with an extremely high tolerance for radiation. The flexibility and efficiency of Nanomech proves the technology suitable for various applications including: automotive, medical, aerospace, military, and industrial applications. Since Nanomech is an embedded apparatus, it has the potential to drastically improve the operations of any device to which it is applied. By extension, Nanomech has the potential to revolutionize any industry in which it is implemented. For this reason, Cavendish’s innovation may have extensive technological impacts. In reference to Cavendish’s Nanomech Rich Wawrzyniak, Senior Analyst at Semico Research Corporation, says that “With the trend towards increasing numbers of CPU and DSP cores, the demand for embedded memory is going to do nothing but grow. The major hurdle is to find memory technologies that can be applied to popular processes and if these technologies don't require exotic materials and are in themselves relatively low cost, and if they give the memory densities at the right speeds, then the growth potential for this technology is very high.” In fact, according to OneSource, by 2012 the global semiconductor market is expected to grow 53.6% to be valued at approximately $434.8 billion. Consequently, Cavendish will find itself in a market saturated with potential customers, each of whom it will offer a cheap, easy to install, solution to enhance their processes.

Labels: Nanotechnology

The National Science Foundation is now soliciting proposals for the creation of a national "Center for Environmental Implications of Nanotechnology", with full proposals due in March. This Center will conduct research on the implications of nanotechnology on the environment and "living systems of all scales". This move is extremely promising given all the attention given to nanotechnology research in recent years, and could reveal important dangers that certain nanotechnologies pose to the environment before they have their effects. The announcement states that any proposals must be for a center with an interdisciplinary approach, combining biological, chemical, physical, computational, mathematical, social and behavioral sciences, ensuring that such a center would focus on all aspects of nanotechnology's effects on the environment.

This announcement comes just around the time of the article in this week's Economist which states "The unusual properties of tiny particles contain huge promise. But nobody knows how safe they are. And too few people are trying to find out." (The Economist. November 24th, 2007. p. 81) The fact that people are worried about unknown consequences of Nanotechnology is a step in the right direction, but we will see if announcements and articles like these will actually lead to the investigative rigor that we would hope for.

Center for the Environmental Implications of Nanotechnology (CEIN)

Labels: Nanotechnology

Carbon nanotubes have long been the in forefront of medical technology, especially given their ability to act as drug carriers within the body. However, researchers remain skeptical as to how friendly they are to the body's tissues and structure. Nanodiamonds are starting to alleviate these fears with their non-toxic properties and and water soluability. Tests of the ability for these tiny structures to deliver anti-tumor medication in patients were recently completed by scientists at Northwestern University and proved successful. Previous methods of delivering these drugs has toxic effects on the body, as they contain materials that destroy healthy cells as well as cancerous ones. The nanodiamond structures act as ferrys for these drugs and prevent them from releasing in to the body until they reach their intended targets.

Tiny diamonds act as anti-cancer drugs

Labels: Nanotechnology

MIT researchers have begun using bio-engineered viruses to build nanomaterials with wide-ranging applications, such as thin battery fibers that may one day be woven directly into clothing. The process, which is being developed by Professor Angela Belcher and her team, has gained the interest of the US military for its potential in creating new types of sensors, solar cells, and batteries, as part of future combat gear. However, there is still a significant amount of work to be done. Currently, all the virus-built fibers really do is glow red under ultraviolet, but Belcher is confident her "directed evolution" development technique will allow her viral construction crew to build more sophisticated fibers soon.

Labels: Nanotechnology

NANOGLOWA is a pan-European research project based in Holland. It brings together academic specialists, power plant owners, and other energy industry experts from 14 European countries. The project has set out to eliminate the problem of CO2 in the atmosphere. The solution, according to the project founders, is to capture the CO2 and bury them in underground "gas fields."

The primary goal of the project is to develop the most efficient way to capture the CO2 emissions in order to move them to the underground holding stations. The project aims to employ the latest in nanotechnology to find their solution. They believe that nanostructured membranes have the capacity to capture and separate carbon dioxide emissions for safe storage. Currently, the cost of installing and maintaining the system is too high to be cost-effective, but the project sponsors are working diligently to create an affordable system.

Should NONOGLOWA prove successful, it could change the current status of fossil fuels. The search for environmentally friendly fuel sources has focused on alternatives to fossil fuels. If the project succeeds, it may remove the high environmental cost of burning fossil fuels.

NANOGLOWA

Labels: Advanced Energy, Nanotechnology

The GoingGreen Conference, a 3-day affair hosted by UC Davis earlier this month, brought together CEO's, Subject Matter Experts, and other decision-makers to discuss the present and future of Green business. The conference's hundreds of attendees were joined by thousands and thousands of interested home-viewers of the conference Webcast. This meeting of the best minds in Green Energy dealt with many different issues for Alternative Energy, including the relationship between Nanotech and Green Energy.

These two technology areas (Nanotech and Green Energy) are deeply intertwined and will evolve together, and the panel called "Emerging Technologies: Green Nanotech and MEMS (Microelectromechanical Systems)" dealt with just how the fields are related. Nanotech has a vast number of applications in Solar Power as well as other areas of Green Business. The entire Webcast Archives are available and deal with topics ranging from "The Biofuel Revolution" to "Smart Green Cities".

"Emerging Technologies: Green Nanotech and MEMS"

Labels: Advanced Energy, Nanotechnology

The scientist who first made possible the small data storage capabilities of devices like the Palm Pilot and the iPod is poised to take this miniaturization to the next level. Stuart Parkin, currently based out of IBM, revolutionized digital storage in the early '90s by manipulating the magnetic properties of tiny areas of a disc to allow for more storage. Now he's developing technology that could surpass flash memory in three to five years, not to mention open doors for engineers to create unprecedented media and communication technologies.

By standing billions of ultrafine wires around a silicon chip and allowing electric currents to move tiny magnets up and down those wires up to speeds of 100 meters a second, making storage extremely faster. Most data storage available now makes can read information at very quick speeds, but its storing capacity remains slower. Parkin's technology has the possibility of not only making storage much faster, but by doing this, could open the door for a change in the way computing works. Data searches, storage and analysis could take place in a entirely new way, and the way we view information could be one step closer to a completely digital world.

Redefining the Architechture of Memory

Labels: Advanced Computing, Nanotechnology

Atomistix A/S is a Danish software firm specializing in solutions for Nanotechnology researchers. Founded in October 2003, Atomistix has developed a system of integrated software modules based on quantum theory - the Atomistix Virtual NanoLab™ - that can accurately calculate properties associated with electron distribution and transport, and simulate experiments with integrated nanoscale systems. Its associated modeling program is called the Atomistix Toolkit. The company's software offers researchers a platform on which to conduct their research and experiment with new structures and interactions, without ever having to enter a laboratory.

There are massive implications for software like those produced by Atomistix. Firstly, modeling software could save researchers huge amounts of time and money spent in the laboratory, and structures only need be created after they are completely modeled, taking into account the strange behavior of structures on so small a level. Secondly, as computing enters new generations, and conventional computers are improved upon and replaced, eventually, by hypercomputers and quantum computers, software for scientific and mathematic modeling will be able to handle more and more complex computations. Next generation software could model the next generation hardware which could in turn lead to a revolution in software, and on and on.

That said, Atomistix and companies like it should be paid serious attention in the future, as they are strategically placed to have a huge impact on the future of technology.

Atomistix

Labels: Advanced Computing, Nanotechnology

As components for electronics get smaller and smaller, and researchers are finding promising methods for making nano-sized devices, the question arises, "Where are we getting the wires for these devices?" A team of researchers at the Canadian National Institute for Nanotechnology (NINT) has discovered a method for producing conductive wires for silicon chips with diameters as small as 10 nanometers, and measuring 50,000 nanometers in length (still only the width of one human hair). The production of these nano-wires uses the process of self-assembly, a way in which molecules recognize and bind to each other, forming nano-sized structures. The discovery has huge implications for the practicality of nano-devices, although an important next step will be to find a method for cheap mass-production.

Molecules Line Up to Make the Tiniest of Wires

Labels: Nanotechnology

Construction of the United States' Microsystems and Engineering Sciences Applications project, or MESA, has been completed--before schedule and under budget. The new complex will house factories, research laboratories, and design facilities for microtechnology and nanotechnology. Completed 3 years before schedule, the early opening will provide a boom in research and development.

The National Laboratories focus on potential uses for micro and nanotechnology for security and trajectory components for nuclear weapons to ensure the effectiveness and safety of America's nuclear arsenal.

The new facility will also provide opportunities for business and academic partnerships with government projects. Along with extensive classified projects, a section of the facility was sectioned off for collaboration.

Sandia National Laboratories Completes Construction

Labels: Nanotechnology

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed a reliable method for the mass-production of nanogap electrodes, a crucial aspect of nanoscale electronics. The researchers were able to balance as many as 16 nanogaps using thin sheets of gold and feedback controlled electromigration (FCE) techniques oringinally developed at Penn.
Although there has been great progress in the last several years in creating nano-sized gaps for electronics, until now there has been little movement towards the reproducibility necessary for industrialization. The development represents an important bridge between the basic research on nano-sized structures and hopes for mass-production and commercialization in the future.

Researchers at University of Pennsylvania Develop Method for Mass Production of Nanogap Electrodes

Labels: Nanotechnology

Researchers at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed a nanoengineered storage device. The paper-thin batteries are 90% cellulose infused with carbon nanotubes. This technology has a great number of potential uses. Its incredible size and weight, its power source, and its ability to function in extreme temperatures make it potentially revolutionary in electronics, medical technology, heavy engineering, and more.

The flexible and lightweight energy source has the capability to use human blood or sweat to help power the battery. It can exist and function properly in temperatures ranging from 300 degrees Fahrenheit and down to 100 below zero. This technology could be used to power future nanotechnology, or to reduce the weight of any number of battery-powered technologies.

Although the materials in the battery are inexpensive, there is not yet a means for effective mass-production. The goal is to develop a system similar to the printing of newspaper--a viable option to due similar specifications and base materials between the nanocomposite paper and newspaper.

http://www.physorg.com/news106245164.html

Labels: Advanced Energy, Nanotechnology