Thursday, December 15, 2011

Dr. Asthana Presentation

All compounds have defects in them. In metals, these are called grain boundaries. Under powerful magnification, these look a lot like small cracks.
File:CrystalGrain.jpg

Materials with small grain boundaries have a lot of grain boundaries in a given area and tend to be highly flexible but also soft. Materials with low grain boundaries have few grain boundaries and hard but very rigid.

Nano and Proteins

MALDI stands for matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectroscopy and is used to analyze large organic molecules. Google it for more information.


microcystin LR:
 1LCM

Collagen:







Amino Acids:
3S46

Nano-powder

Our group is attempting to create a more powerful ballistics powder than we currently have. The military is always trying to make more deadly weapons, it’s been a while since they have come up with a new form of gunpowder. Our hope is that through nanotechnology, we can create a superior gunpowder.

The Nano-powder will be comprised of the same chemicals used to make gunpowder but at the nano scale. The idea is that by reducing the grain size, we will increase the surface area and thus the volatility of the compound.

Using magnetic stir bars, we would mix together the chemicals and water then press the paste through a screen to make small equally sized pellets. This is very similar to how they make gunpowder today; however, each of our individual pellets would be more flammable, making a bullet filled with this powder more powerful.

Obviously this powder would be dangerous if not handled correctly.

I don’t know the cost of mass-producing this powder; however, the US military has quite a lot of funding. Therefore, the cost is not a large concern.

The same regulations used to produce all flammable substances would be used. I don’t know the regulations as that would likely be covered by the government funded production campany.

The consumer of this product would likely be military and therefore accept the product graciously.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Group Project

We are going to work on Nano-powder, a ultra-fine version of gunpowder that is two have to basic uses:
1) Mini explosions
2) Larger explosions with low volume of powder

Our Group is
1) Kymble Sanderson
2) Elliott Carroll
3) Richard Hoverman
4) Bryant Hagen

Interesting Nano Applications

Bio-technical applications
   -http://www.merkle.com/papers/bionano.html
Military applications
http://www.nanowerk.com/spotlight/spotid=1015.php
Apparel applications
http://www.nanotex.com/
Cleaning products
http://www.understandingnano.com/cleaning.html
Electronics
http://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/nanotechnology/the-future-of-nanotechnology-in-the-mobile-phone  (watch the video)
Youtube Nokia Morph commercial
Moniters and screens 
youtube Nanotechnology TV Sony
Adhesives
http://www.nanowerk.com/spotlight/spotid=3180.php

10 Nanotech Sources

Here are a few good sources for information on nanotechnology:
http://nanotechnology.com/
www.nist.gov 

     - specifically the "Small Nanoparticles Bring Big Improvement to Medical Imaging" article

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Laser Diffraction Experiment

We are working with four different patterns. The left 2 patterns consist of vertical lines and the right 2 pattern consist of horizontal lines. When the laser projected through the patterns, we saw something like this:

(This is not to scale)

The lasers were placed 1 m away from a sheet a paper.
Red laser:
The top two patterns created a line of dots 1 cm apart and the bottom two patterns created a line of dots 1.5 cm apart.
Green laser:
The top two patterns created a line of dots 1 cm apart and the bottom two patterns created a line of dots 1.25 cm apart.

Therefore the distance between the top pattern's lines are 160 nm and 60 nm thick.
And the  distance between the top pattern's lines are 130 nm and 60 nm thick.