Contents

1. Introduction
2. Synthesis and Processing
3. Biomedical Materials
4. Smart Materials
5. Biomimetics and Self-assembly
6. Nanoscale Materials and Assembly
7. Future Information Technologies
8. Display Technology
9. Ultrastrong Fibers
10. Materials Made To Measure

Glossary

Catalyst: A substance that accelerates the rate of a chemical reaction.
Ceramic: An inorganic substance composed of two or more elements, which is typically hard and brittle. Most ceramics are compounds of metals with non-metals; many are metal oxides.
Composite material: A substance comprised of more than one kind of fabric, such as graphite fibers embedded in an organic resin.
Covalent bond: The chemical bond that normally holds atoms together in molecules.
DNA: Deoxyribonucleic acid, the polymer that encodes an organism's genetic information.
Inorganic: Composed primarily of elements other than carbon, e.g., metals. Rocks and ceramic materials are considered to be inorganic.
Materials science: The discipline concerned with developing new materials for technology, industry and medicine, and for understanding the factors that control the properties (mechanical, electronic, magnetic, chemical, etc.) of materials.
Micrometer: A thousandth of a millimeter (mm): roughly the size of a typical human cell or a bacterium.
Nanometer: A millionth of a millimeter (nm): roughly the size of a typical medium-sized molecule.
Nanotechnology: Engineering of components and devices of nanometer dimensions.
Optoelectronics: A combination of electronics with information processing based on light signals: for example, the use of optical fibers to carry signals in long-distance telecommunications.
Organic: Composed of primarily carbon-based molecules, often (but not necessarily) related to those that appear in living organisms.
Piezoelectricity: The generation of an electric field by the pressure applied to a material. Conversely, an applied electric field will deform a piezoelectric material.
Polymer: A substance whose molecules consist of many small molecules linked together by chemical bonds. Most plastics are linear polymers, whose component parts are linked into long molecular chains.
Protein: A biological polymer made by linking together amino acids. Proteins range in size from chains of a few dozen to several thousand amino acids.
Semiconductor: A material with a small electrical conductivity that increases with temperature. Typical semiconductors like silicon have a conductivity intermediate between that of metals and non-conducting (insulating) materials.
Superconductor: A material that conducts electricity with zero electrical resistance. In theory, the tiniest voltage will generate an infinite current in such a material, and a current will circulate around a superconducting loop forever.
Surfactant: Usually a soap-like organic molecule with both water-soluble and oil-soluble parts.
Transistor: The "workhorse" of electronic and computer circuitry. The transistor is basically a switch that can be opened or closed, to control the flow of an electrical current, by applying a voltage to one of its terminals.

Summary

The development of new techniques for seeing and manipulating matter from the atomic scale upwards has enabled an increasing element of rational design to be incorporated into materials innovation, enabling materials to be tailored to particular tasks. In particular, these technical developments are shrinking the size scales at which engineering can be conducted. Concomitantly, materials science has experienced a trend away from structural materials towards functional ones: from materials that perform some passive structural role (generally supporting a heavy load) to ones that perform some active function, such as generating an electrical current or closing a valve. This change makes materials increasingly important for a wide range of technologies, notably medicine and information technology. The materials of the future will therefore arise from collaborative efforts between scientists ranging from electronic engineers to chemists to cell biologists.

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