What is Nanomanufacturing?

Nanomanufacturing is the controllable manipulation of materials structures, components, devices, and systems at the nanoscale (1 to 100 nanometers) in one, two, and three dimensions for large-scale reproducibility of value-added components and devices. Nanomanufacturing remains the essential bridge between the discoveries of the nanosciences and real-world nanotechnology products.

Advancing nanotechnology from the laboratory into high-volume production ultimately requires careful study of manufacturing system issues including product design, reliability and quality, process design and control, shop floor operations and supply chain management. Nanomanufacturing encompasses bottom-up directed assembly, top-down high resolution processing, molecular systems engineering, and hierarchical integration with larger scale systems. As dimensional scales of materials and molecular systems approach the nanoscale, the conventional rules governing the behavior and properties of these components, devices, and systems change significantly. As such, the behavior of the final product is enabled by the collective performance of the nanoscale building blocks. 

Research Challenges

The challenges facing nanomanufacturing systems integration represents an inherently multi-disciplinary set of problems addressing issues for working with structures in the 0.1-100 nm regime that must combine the range of top-down and bottom-up processes available in order to provide multi-scale systems integration. To achieve the necessary economy of scale for large-scale production, new concepts and principles must be envisioned providing revolutionary approaches, thereby extending the capabilities of existing manufacturing and infrastructure. A cross-section of scientific disciplines is contributing to the greater understanding and control of nanoscale phenomena—physics, chemistry, biology, material and information sciences, engineering, and polymer science. The collective knowledge of these disciplines will redefine the relationships between materials, processes and property phenomena, allowing for the creation of revolutionary nanomanufacturing techniques. Those techniques will help to bridge the manufacturing gap between the innovations of the research laboratory and the economic viability of nanotechnology.

The critical challenges for nanomanufacturing are the need to control assembly of three-dimensional heterogeneous systems; to process nanoscale structures in high-rate/high-volume applications without compromising their inherent properties; and to ensure the long-term reliability of nanostructures through testing and metrics. These challenges reflect the need for research in the characterization of nanomaterials and nanoparticles as the building-blocks of nanostructures, and in the fabrication and synthesis of both top-down and bottom-up processes. Further, they require advanced instrumentation to characterize and measure nanostructures, to provide predictive simulation of nanostructure behavior, and to contribute to the design and integration of nanodevices and systems. Finally, knowledge sharing and outreach is a challenge to be overcome to enable technology transfer and to contribute to public awareness of nanotechnologies.

Context 

Much of the momentum for nanomanufacturing emanates from the semiconductor industry, where the push to create smaller, faster, and more efficient microprocessors has heralded the creation of circuitry less than 100 nanometers in size.

Federally, the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) is a cross-departmental program that has been working since 2001 to support and advance the development of nanotechnologies in the United States. The NNI has identified nanomanufacturing as one of seven Program Component Areas and, in 2006, earmarked $47 million for research in this domain. Also since 2001, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has funded four Nanoscale Science and Engineering Centers explicitly focused on manufacturing.

With nearly 60 federally funded research centers under NNI governance and over 1200 nanotech companies based in the USA as of 2006, the drive to move nanotechnology from laboratory to marketplace is strong.

Areas of application for nanomanufacturing include:

• Electronics and Semiconductor Industries
  
• IT and Telecommunications
• Aerospace and Automotive Industries
• Energy and Utilities
• Materials and Chemical Industries
• Forest and Paper Products
• Food Industries
  
• Pharma, Biomed and Biotechnology
• Environment and National Security
• Clothing and Personal Care
  

References

• Busnaina, Ahmed. Nanomanufacturing Handbook. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press/Taylor & Francis; 2007, 1-31.
• Biscarini, Fabio, et al. “Nanomanufacturing and Processing—Research, Education, Infrastructure, Security, Resource.” Journal of Manufacturing Science and Engineering 124 (2002) 489-490.
• Haris Doumanidis. “The Nanomanufacturing Programme at the National Science Foundation.” Nanotechnology 13 (2002) 248-252.
• NSET Subcommittee, Committee on Technology. The National Nanotechnology Initiative: Research and Development Leading to a Revolution in Technology and Industry—Supplement to the President’s 2006 Budget. National Nanotechnology Initiative. March 2005.
• Karen F. Schmidt. Nanofrontiers: Visions for the Future of Nanotechnology. Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies. March 2007.
• Nanovip.com, the International Nanotechnology Business Directory. Accessed 7/26/07 http://www.nanovip.com/.