This is the first of a series of information sheets, on emerging technologies to inform
the Department about topics that are likely to be of growing importance to defence,
produced by a panel comprising some of the UK’s leading experts (see box below).
In addition to MOD staff led by the Chief Scientific Advisor (CSA), the Nanotechnology Panel
comprised UK and world leading scientists and engineers from academia.
Professor Richard Bushby is Professor of physical organic chemistry at Leeds University and Director of the Centre
for Self-Organising Molecular Systems (SOMS). His main scientific interests are in self-organised molecular systems,
particularly polymer magnets, liquid crystals and biomembrane based sensors.
Professor John Chapman is a Professor of physics at Glasgow University and his research activities centre around
the high spatial resolution characterisation of advanced functional materials and devices. He has a particular interest in
nanomagnetism and, until recently, chaired the now completed EPSRC Advanced Magnetics Programme.
Professor John Pethica is Professor of Materials Science at Oxford University and is a Fellow of the Royal Society.
His interests include probe microscopy, nanomechanics and thin films, interfaces, liquid and molecular structure as well as
atom manipulation. He was formerly Director of Nano Instruments Inc. USA.
Professor Michael C Petty is a Professor in, and formerly Chairman of, the School of Engineering at the University
of Durham. He is currently Co-Director of the Durham Centre for Molecular and Nanoscale Electronics, a board member
of the Institute of Nanotechnology and UK editor of the journal “Materials Science and Engineering C”.
NANOTECHNOLOGY:
ITS IMPACT ON DEFENCE AND THE MOD
MINISTRY OF DEFENCE
Nanotechnology is the name given to a new field of science and technology where the component
parts can be measured in some tens of atom diameters or even less; around a millionth of a millimetre.
This not only means that complex and sophisticated systems can be incredibly small, but because they
work at the atomic scale, new principles of physics apply and novel and revolutionary applications are
possible.
For defence the implications could be enormous, both in terms of the opportunities it might offer to
grow our own military capability, and the new threats it might lead to.
The list of possibilities is long but includes:-
1
The Nanotechnology Panel
Nanotechnology - Why Should Defence Take Notice?
■ Completely secure messaging
■ Intelligent and completely autonomous
short and long range highly accurate
weapons
■ Improved stealth but also means to defeat
current stealth techniques
■ Global information networks and local
battlefield systems with "all-seeing"
sensors
■ Miniature high energy battery and power
supplies
■ Intelligent decision aids
■ Self repairing military equipment
■ New vaccines and medical treatments
■ Highly sensitive miniature multiple
biological and chemical sensors
■ Un-ethical use leading to new biological
and chemical weapons
