Ben Egbert
Nanotubes and Nanowires
Intro to Nanotechnology
11/8/13
Through the development of nanotechnology we have been able to study uses of
nanowires and nanotubes and how they affect the lives of people’s daily interaction with
electronics. Nanowires are a nanoscale rod made of semiconducting material, used in
miniature transistors and some laser applications. The smaller the transistors the more chances
we have to store information. Nanotubes are large molecules of pure carbon that are long, thin
and shaped like tubes. As individual molecules, nanotubes are 100 times stronger-than-steel
and one-sixth its weight. Some carbon nanotubes can be extremely efficient conductors of
electricity and heat; depending on their configuration, some act as semiconductors.
Today we see that there are a lot of different kinds of technology and sciences that
make daily life more convenient and more compact. Nanotechnology is one of the sciences.
This technology is being studied and tested today, helping make our lives more convenient. In
the last decade, we can truly see that our cell phones and computers have been influenced by
nanotechnology. We have been able take cell phones of the past, that used to be the size of
cinder blocks, to what we have today. Phones are now being made even smaller than our very
hands and are in comparison to the old phones are supergiants in the capability.
We can also compare the very first computers ever built. The first computer ever built
was the size of a normal office area. Having to be built with lots of big bulky parts that would
take up a whole room, now we have an entire computer that we can use that sometimes is less
than the size of our dinner plates. It is amazing the things are able to do as we have shrunk the
tools of our daily lives into such convenient small packages. The biggest contributing research
that has applied to our technology today is the use of nanowires and nanotubes.
We can see with the use of any kind of electronic device it tends to heat up. With the
different kinds of extension cords and metals that are in the cords as well with our machines we
know that they can get hot. With electric things it’s impossible to avoid them heating up, but
with recent research with nanowires and tubes they have been able to reduce heat significantly.
According to the study of Bifano, Michael F. P. and Vikas Prakash “A multilayer elasticity
model is developed to investigate the effects of acoustically stiffened surfaces (increased surface
moduli) on the specific heat and thermal conductivity of typical nanowire and nanotubes as a
function of temperature. Changes in phonon dispersion are analyzed using approximated
phonon dispersion relations that result from the solutions to the frequency equation of a
vibrating elastic tube or rod. The results of the investigation indicate a 10% reduction in specific
heat and a 2% decrease in lattice thermal conductivity at 50 K for a 10 nm outer diameter
crystalline nanotube with an inner diameter of 5 nm when the average Young's modulus of the
first three atomic layers on both the inner and outer free surfaces are increased by a factor of
1.87. In contrast, a 10 nm outer diameter nanowire composed of the same material and with an
acoustically stiffened outer shell shows an approximate 30% increase in thermal conductivity
and specific heat near 50 K.”
With the use of electricity and electronics, there has always been the problem with
heating up. One of biggest problems with the original computer was keeping the system cool.
This was one of the reasons that they made it so big. So with the continuing study of
electronics we have been able to improve the limitations of the buildup of heat. Even though
we have had these improvements we are still being plagued with the problem of heat buildup.
We can see from the study that nanotechnology studies are being tested and proven that heat
is once again being greatly limited with the flow of electricity being the same or greater. The
biggest thing of lessening the heat build is the flow of the electricity itself.
Nanowires are the material that is bringing our electronics into the future. The wires
being oh so small are going to be giants within our daily electronics. With the tests of different
elemental nanowires we are beginning to see that these little wires are more conductive than
the wire have today. This gives us the chance for faster transition of data and faster flow of
electricity.
Gao, Tongchuan, and Paul W. Leu explain through their studies what conclusions they have
come to with their studies. “Metallic nanowires have demonstrated high optical transmission
and electrical conductivity with potential for application as transparent electrodes that may be
used in flexible devices. In this paper, we systematically investigated the electrical and optical
properties of 1D and 2D copper nanowire (Cu NW) arrays as a function of diameter and pitch
and compared their performance to that of Cu thin films and our recent results on silver (Ag)
NW arrays. Cu NWs exhibit enhanced transmission over thin films due to propagating resonance
modes between NWs.”
As technology has advanced we have been able to see that the amount of data that we
are able to store on a storage device has continuously increased as the actual size of the device
that’s being made continuously decreases. Every electronic device we have today has a circuit
board inside with many different kinds of components that store data, store electricity, turn the
device on and off, and so many other things. With the use of Nanowires, scientists have been
able to store more electricity within them compared to what we use today.
According to the studies of scientists from the American institute of Physics the have come up
with this statement from their research “The study of electrochemical super-capacitors has
become one of the most attractive topics in both academia and industry as energy storage
devices because of their high power density, long life cycles, and high charge/discharge
efficiency. Recently, there has been increasing interest in the development of multifunctional
structural energy storage devices such as structural super-capacitors for applications in
aerospace, automobiles, and portable electronics. These multifunctional structural super-
capacitors provide structures combining energy storage and load bearing functionalities,
leading to material systems with reduced volume and/or weight.”
So with the reducing size of the components of electronics we are able to then slowly
make our very own devices smaller and smaller. It is predicted that as we continue to study
these nano sized electronic building blocks we will have devices are as light as air. By using
nanowires they are able to have a flat bendable silicon surface embedded with all these
miniaturized components that could eventually, with development, turn into very own cell
phones, laptops and whatever other electronic device we make between now and the end of
time.
So we can see that nanowires and nanotubes are the basic building blocks that will lead us to a
better technological future. So instead of us just sci fi movies and seeing all these cool gadgets,
wishing that they were really in our possession, our wishes will become our reality. From those
cool high tech glasses that have their very own camera and computer in them to our very own
“Jarvis” computer system from Iron Man. Combining these elements together and making
devices with these nanoscale materials, we will be able to more effectively conserve energy and
make this world a better place.
Bibliography
Shuvo, Mohammad Arif Ishtiaque, et al. "Nanowire Modified Carbon Fibers For Enhanced
Electrical Energy Storage." Journal Of Applied Physics 114.10 (2013): 104306. Academic Search
Premier. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.
Bifano, Michael F. P., and Vikas Prakash. "Thermal Properties Of Nanotubes And Nanowires
With Acoustically Stiffened Surfaces." Journal Of Applied Physics 111.3 (2012): 034319.
Academic Search Premier. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.
Gao, Tongchuan, and Paul W. Leu. "Copper Nanowire Arrays For Transparent Electrodes."
Journal Of Applied Physics 114.6 (2013): 063107. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.