Now is the time to put molecules to work for us, according to a nanotechnology scientist who discovered a new spherical molecule, writes Kathy Burke.
Harry Kroto has the rare ability to illuminate the often-turgid detail of fundamental research for his audience by relating science to art, society and life. His Academy Times lecture tomorrow evening entitled "NanoSpace Odyssey" will discuss nanotechnology and its importance for 21st-century science. The free public talk is organised jointly by the Royal Irish Academy, The Irish Times and the British Council.
He notes that many people don't understand the buzzwords of nanoscience and nanotechnology. "I would hope to help ensure that people understand these things and recognise that all science has benefits, yet most powerful technologies can be used for benefit or detriment. It's a case of what people decide to do with it," he says.
"Nanotechnology is a general term describing some aspects of chemistry, molecular physics and molecular biology. I think of 20th-century chemistry and molecular science in particular as a period when we worked out how atoms stuck together and how we could create modest-sized molecules. In my view, in the 21st century we will start to make the molecules do things."
From computing, transport and civil engineering through to medical components, all sorts of technology are getting smaller for better functionality. However, the existing "top-down" process of making things smaller is quickly reaching a physical limit at 10 nanometres. To get smaller again, we must start with atoms and build from the bottom up, says Kroto.
"Living systems do that," he says. "Haemoglobin is a nano-device. The molecule changes shape to capture oxygen in the lungs, transports it through the body, and releases it where it is needed for metabolism," he says.
"A virus would be another. We should learn from these and create equally clever molecules. In microelectronics, some molecules already look like they may act as the switches you need for molecular computers."
Although designer molecules with remarkable properties have been produced in small amounts, it would take "the age of the universe" to assemble even one milligram of material atom-by-atom. Learning the secret of how living systems self-replicate and grow remains the major puzzle, he believes.
"Nanotubes, if we could make them in sufficient amounts, would revolutionise transport. We can't do that at the moment," Kroto says. But history - including Kroto's own Nobel-winning discoveries, shows that science has overcome such frontiers before.
Kroto and co-researchers Bob Curl and Rick Smalley won the 1996 Nobel Prize in chemistry for the discovery of a new, spherical molecule called carbon 60, Buckminsterfullerene.
"It opened our eyes to aspects of how nano-scale structures form and the factors that govern them, which we didn't understand before. We didn't realise that sheets of material would close up to form closed structures."
He points to where the structure already exists in nature - in the fly's eye and lotus leaf for example, and in architecture, such as the Pantheon dome.
Kroto has pointed out that the research would not be given priority in today's research climate. "Sometimes finding what you've been looking for is not always the best. Sometimes it is better to find something you weren't looking for," he says.
"Science and technology are moving ahead very fast, but we are not developing social responsibility at the same pace," Kroto believes. "We are producing extremely powerful technologies and it seems to me that we still have a lot to learn about how to interact and how to get on with each other."
A few tickets remain for the talk to be given by Sir Harry tomorrow at 6.30pm in the Burke Lecture Theatre, Arts Block, Trinity College Dublin. These are available by dialling the RIA at 676-2570.