Environmental stability of nanoscale materials for catalysis and sensing

经过20年的研究，第一波“纳米技术”消费产品正在进入市场，现在每年正在生产大量的纳米粒子（尺寸小于百万分之一厘米）。然而，在制造任何新产品之前，我们需要知道工程纳米材料在我们把它们带入家庭之前有多稳定，否则我们会（无意中）发现它们在我们的水道和其他生态系统中自由存在。该项目首次使用高性能超级计算和先进的理论模型来预测纳米材料在各种环境条件下的稳定性，以帮助保护澳大利亚免受与这些微小物质相关的潜在“纳米危害”。

After two decades of research, the first wave of 'nanotechnology' consumer products are entering the market, and large quantities of nanoparticles (less than millionth of a centimetre in size) are now being produced annually. However, before any new product can be manufactured, we need to know how stable engineered nanomaterials are before we bring them into our home, or we find them (unintentionally) free in our waterways and other ecosystems. For the first time, this project uses high performance supercomputing and advanced theoretical modelling to predict the stability of nanomaterials under a wide range of environmental conditions, to help safe guard Australia from potential 'nano-hazards' associated with these tiny pieces of matter.