1. What is the nanoworld?

The nanoworld is the continent of the infinitely small, of the atomic domain, where the laws of physics are changing and evolving towards those of quantum mechanics.

The unit of measurement is the nanometer. The prefix "nano" comes from the Greek and means "very small". A nanometer is one billionth of a meter, or 0.000 000 001 meters (10 - ⁹ ), a million times smaller than a millimeter. A nanometer is 500,000 times thinner than a ballpoint pen stroke, 50,000 times thinner than the thickness of a human hair.

The nanoworld is where physics, chemistry and biology meet. Nanotechnology is the study of materials and related technologies.

The following illustration of the nanoworld shows that we are working at the structural level of matter, manipulating materials of sizes similar...