Move over Silicon cities. it is now the turn of Nano cities. Bangalore is now called the nano city of India, joining the likes of San Jose, CA; Boston, MA; San Francisco, CA;Oakland, CA; and Middlesex-Essex, MA•

What makes a city nanocity? Firstly, it should have investments, infrastructure and R&D to support the new technology and it should have institutes, companies and business involving nanotechnology. Nanotechnology companies work in 3 main sectors namely materials, medicine and health, and tools and instruments.

Bangalore was declared the “nano city of India” at the ‘Bangalore Nano 2008′ conference-cum-exposition by Vice President Hamid Ansari.  According to Silicon India, the declaration came after the Karnataka government announced that it would take measures to encourage research and development in nanoscience and facilitate development of the nanotechnology industry in the state. 

Does Bangalore city have the infrastructure to become the nanocity of India? Read more

Hotmail founder Sabir Bhatia’s nano city is not in Bangalore but in Haryana. He has tied up with Parsvnath developers and says, “India lacks large, planned commercial & residential districts with modern concepts and quality facilities. We will make Nano City a world-class destination.” Bhatia’s dream city is expected to be ready by 2010.

Here’s a book by Williams Sims Bainbridge on the convergence of nanotechnology without the usual scientific jargon. It seems like an interesting read on nanotechnology and cognitive science drawn from a varied background of science, technology and culture with historical examples from as far as Egypt and Asia.  As one reader puts it succintly,

“It is rare to find someone who brings to the table such breadth and depth of knowledge, spanning so many of the sciences, from physics through cognition. Bainbridge is a Renaissance man who is helping to both create and elucidate the potential future worlds that confront us. Ultimately, he is a visionary who is building a roadmap for a future that we can all help to shape. He is to be commended for sharing both this map and his journey with us.”

Always thought materials expand when exposed to heat? Not always.  The all new ultra flexible materials are breaking traditional rules of flexibility and exhibiting properties that defy the old school of physics. 

Here’s a story by the univerity of Cambridge that throws light on how new materials are redefining the rules of physics.

Fuelled by rapidly developing electronics and telecommunications industries, the global demand for high-performance materials is insatiable. In the UK alone, annual turnover associated with the design, manufacture and processing of materials exceeds £200 billion – income that relies on devising smaller, faster, stronger, cheaper and increasingly eco-friendly technologies. The challenge faced by the scientific community is that of meeting this demand by identifying new materials with ever more extreme capabilities.

Dr Andrew Goodwin, a Trinity College Research Fellow in the Department of Earth Sciences, has been tackling this problem by designing materials with ultra-flexible atomic-scale structures. Just as a collapsible toy sphere has entirely different properties from those of the plastic from which it is assembled, so too can these ultra-flexible materials break all the rules that ‘traditional’ systems are forced to obey.
>>More

Now you can add another phobia to its ever growing list. BTW, what’s the plural of phobia, phobias? Nevermind the grammer, here is the story in TOI about nanophobia, which is the fear of small particles.

It is that time of the year again for all the nano geeks and the scientific mavericks and manufacturers to meet at the Bangalore nano conference scheduled December 11-13 2008 at the Grand Ashok Bangalore.

The theme of the 2nd Bangalore nano conference is ‘Nanotechnology in India’s future’.

Download the brochure for more details.