In a dust-free lab, under special lights, scientists create new materials and structures.
FURSINA: Here I'm creating a metal structure of a really small size, the size of one-tenth of a human hair.
A controlled environment is vital in the nanoworld, where size and distance are measured
in billionths of meters.
HUA: It's a very good environment for us to fabricate state of art devices.
The clean room is part of the Voelte-Keegan Nanoscience Research Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
The center provides sophisticated research facilities for 80 faculty associated with the Nebraska Center for Materials and Nanoscience.
TSMBAL: The establishment of this nanoscience research center will impact our MRSEC in such a way that we can broaden
the scope of our research abilities.
MRSEC is UNL's prestigious Materials Research Science and Engineering Center funded by the National Science Foundation.
MRSEC is part of a network of elite centers across the nation and is embedded in UNL's nanoscience center.
TSYMBAL: We want to understand why this property is so different and for that we need capabilities, new instruments
and capabilities to first fabricate this materials, then characterize the properties
then make devices out of it.
NARRATOR: The center also houses a powerful microscope that brings the nanoworld into focus.
SELLMYER: This is a new electron microscope, a state of the art microscope and it really has a high resolution
so we can investigate the nanosctructures that we make at a very small scale and essentially see atoms and how they are arranged.
NARRATOR: Nano technology promises to revolutionize products in medicine, energy and electronics.
UNL's new facility provides the collaborative environment and tools necessary for future discoveries.
SELLMYER: You have to get a variety of different kinds of expertise together to push hard and solve the energy materials problems
or nanoelectronics problems which are some of the major challenges of the future.
NARRATOR: Nebraska's economy also stands to benefit from an area that often leads to spin-off companies and new industry.
Everything's made out of material and nanostructured materials are important for that.
So the activities here are quite relevant to the economic health of Nebraska.
NARRATOR: The University of Nebraska-Lincoln moves a world measured in nanometers to the world-class research arena.
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