VOLUME 1 NUMBER 1 (January to December 2008)

Visualizing and modifying objects at the nanometer length scales

In the closing of the millennium, our civilization has seen the rise in scientific and popular interest in tiny entities. We have come to accept as common place, previously unexpected and seemingly impossible effects that occur at very short length scales. We have developed new theories that are rooted in quantum mechanics and built sophisticated tools to model, investigate and fabricate small, densely-packed devices for faster and more powerful computers, for storing and retrieving massive amounts of data, for diagnosis and treatment of diseases, for generation of energy and for providing new insights into the nature of matter. We have coined the word “nanotechnology”, which has become a universal term to denote systems that are on the order of a nanometer - a billionth (10^-9) of ameter, comparable to interatomic spacing in solids.