{"id":350,"date":"2017-04-18T13:54:53","date_gmt":"2017-04-18T04:24:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/nano-news\/?p=350"},"modified":"2017-04-18T13:54:53","modified_gmt":"2017-04-18T04:24:53","slug":"nanotechnology-and-nanomaterials-where-science-meets-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/nano-news\/2017\/04\/18\/nanotechnology-and-nanomaterials-where-science-meets-art\/","title":{"rendered":"Nanotechnology and nanomaterials; where science meets art"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Oskar Majeswki<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is no secret that a lot of great work has been done with carbon nanotubes at the Flinders Centre for NanoScale Science and Technology.\u00a0 This includes practical research, such as their incorporation into solar cells<\/a>, in flexible transparent electrodes<\/a> and as high performance tips for AFM imaging<\/a>, as well as fundamental research, such as improving their sorting by chirality<\/a> and diameter<\/a>, and even slicing them to the desired lengths with the use of lasers<\/a>.\u00a0 With their potential benefits as a nanomaterial, this cutting edge and interesting research has lead carbon nanotubes to capture the public\u2019s imagination like no material has previously.<\/p>\n

Given their amazing properties, such as an incredible strength-to-weight ratio, and their ability to conduct heat and electricity better than copper, it is no wonder that many consumer products are starting to feature carbon nanotubes.\u00a0 For UK company Surrey NanoSystems<\/a> however, it is the light absorbance properties of carbon nanotubes that has caught their eye. Cue VantaBlack<\/em>; a product which is essentially a treatment process for coating literally any surface in a dense \u201cforest\u201d of carbon nanotubes, giving everyday objects an unnerving, black hole-like appearance<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/a>
A sample of VantaBlack<\/em> applied to a crinkled piece of aluminium foil, illustrating the total absence of texture seen when it is applied to a 3D surface. Image source<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Photos of objects coated in VantaBlack<\/em> soon went viral on the internet, and suddenly a material ubiquitously known to nanotechnology researchers and students was gaining widespread coverage.\u00a0 This resulted in many people asking \u201cwhere do I buy this?\u201d and \u201ccan it be applied to this object?\u201d, with many people probably having no idea that this product contained such a widely researched nanomaterial. \u00a0Certainly, something so unusual can stir quite an emotional response from a lot of people.<\/p>\n

Here the story of this remarkable product takes a darker turn. As artists began inquiring about obtaining VantaBlack<\/em> for use in their artwork, they found that Surrey NanoSystems had established an exclusive licencing agreement with controversial British artist, Anish Kapoor<\/a>.\u00a0 Colour is known to affect a person\u2019s mood and is a central aspect of all visual art; so needless to say, having exclusive access to the world\u2019s blackest known material caused quite a backlash from the art community.\u00a0 Enter a collaborative effort involving thousands of \u201ccolour chemists, specialists from the cosmetics industry and architectural coatings experts\u201d spearheaded by another British artist, Stuart Semple.\u00a0 This has resulted in the creation of Black 2.0<\/em>.\u00a0 This product is touted as being \u201cthe most pigmented, flattest, mattest, black acrylic paint in the world\u201d.\u00a0 Interestingly, unlike VantaBlack<\/em>, it does not require state-of-the-art lab equipment and special handling; only a paintbrush, roller or airbrush for application, and is readily available and reasonably cheap<\/a>.\u00a0 It is not explicitly stated whether Black 2.0<\/em> is also based on carbon nanotubes, but comparing images of objects coated with both Black 2.0<\/em><\/a> and VantaBlack<\/em><\/a>, it would be unsurprising if it did.<\/p>\n

There are many possible morals to take from this story. First and foremost, that often when a scientific discovery is made, it is hard to predict the myriad real world applications people will find for it.\u00a0 Secondly, as the old saying goes, necessity is the mother of all invention.\u00a0 With the increased connectivity between people and the effective democratisation and accessibility of knowledge on the internet, coupled with the newly invigorated \u201cmaker\u201d movement, I predict we will be seeing more of these sorts of stories.\u00a0 It is impressive to think a collaboration of likeminded artists and scientists have effectively reverse engineered and arguably improved upon a cutting-edge scientific discovery, making it more accessible in the process.\u00a0 Lastly, I don\u2019t think scientists should hold back from finding \u201cout of the box\u201d applications of their work, especially when it comes to things like art.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Oskar Majeswki It is no secret that a lot of great work has been done with carbon nanotubes at the Flinders Centre for NanoScale Science […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":202,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nNanotechnology and nanomaterials; where science meets art - Nano News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.flinders.edu.au\/nano-news\/2017\/04\/18\/nanotechnology-and-nanomaterials-where-science-meets-art\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Nanotechnology and nanomaterials; 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