- •Contents
- •Предисловие
- •Unit one
- •Lesson one
- •Lesson two
- •Text a What is nanotechnology?
- •Lesson three
- •Lesson four
- •Text c Nanotechnology
- •Check list to Unit I
- •Unit two
- •Lesson one
- •Lesson two
- •Text a Nanomaterials
- •Lesson three
- •Text b Nanotechnologies and nanomaterials in electrical and electronic goods
- •Lesson four
- •Text c The Latest Miracle Nanomaterial
- •Check list to Unit II.
- •Unit three
- •Lesson one
- •Lesson two
- •Text a Applications of nanotechnology
- •Lesson 3
- •Text b Applications of Nanomaterials in Electronics
- •Lesson 4
- •Check list to Unit III
- •Unit four
- •Lesson one
- •Lesson two
- •Text a nanotechnologies - huge opportunities and many unknowns
- •Lesson three
- •Text b What are nanotechnology’s prospects?
- •Lesson four
- •Nanomaterials – Potential Risks for Human Health and the Environment
- •Checklist to unit IV
- •Text II
- •Text III.
- •Faster, lighter computers possible with nanotechnology
- •Computing applications
- •Text IV
- •Closeness breeds material changes
- •Health and environmental issues
- •Potential for Human Exposure and Environmental Contamination
- •Toxicity
- •Text VII
- •A Center for Nanotechnology
- •Text VIII
- •Use of Nanomaterials in Lighting/Displays
- •Text IX
- •Use of Nanomaterials in Lasers
- •Text XI Nanotechnology Coatings
- •Appendix 2 word formation Словообразование
- •1. Underline the stems in the following words
- •2. Which of the given words are nouns or verbs? Why?
- •11. Read the following words. What are their prefixes? stems? suffixes?
- •12. Translate into Russian in writing
- •13. Translate the following words into Russian. Say how they were formed
- •14. Form as many new words as possible from the following ones:
- •Конверсия
- •16. Look up the meanings of these words in a dictionary, if necessary. How are they translated in the sentences below? Mind the word order
- •Предлоги и союзы. Фразовые глаголы
- •In case, unless, provided/providing:
- •In, at, on для обозначения места:
- •Appendix 3
- •Information on Abstracts
- •Краткий грамматический справочник
- •1. Глагол
- •1. Основные формы глагола
- •§ 2. Система грамматических времен английского языка (English Tenses)
- •Времена группы Indefinite
- •Спряжение глаголов группы Indefinite
- •2. Времена группы Continuous
- •Спряжение глаголов группы Continuous
- •3. Времена группы Perfect
- •4. Времена группы Perfect Continuous
- •Спряжение глаголов группы Perfect Continuous
- •3. Страдательный залог (The Passive Voice)
- •1. Способы перевода глагола-сказуемого
- •4. Согласование времен (The Sequence of Tenses)
- •5. Модальные глаголы (Modal Verbs)
- •Наиболее употребительные модальные глаголы и их эквиваленты
- •6. Сослагательное наклонение (The Subjunctive Mood)
- •7. Условные предложения (The Conditional Clauses)
- •Бессоюзные условные предложения
- •8. Глагол to be (to be - was, were - been)
- •9. Глагол to have (to have — had — had)
- •The infinitive
- •1. Forms of the infinitive
- •2. Functions of the infinitive
- •3. Infinitive constructions
- •The participle
- •1. Forms of the participle
- •2. Functions of the participle
- •3. Participle constructions
- •The gerund
- •1. Forms of the gerund
- •2. Functions of the gerund
- •3. Complex gerund construction
- •Краткий терминологический словарь
- •Список литературы
Text III.
I. Read the text looking for the information about ferroelectric polarization and how it influences an electrical field.
Faster, lighter computers possible with nanotechnology
Smaller, lighter computers and an end to worries about electrical failures sending hours of onscreen work into an inaccessible limbo mark the potential result of Argonne research on tiny ferroelectric crystals.
"Tiny" means billionths of a meter, or about 1/5OOth the width of a human hair. These nanomaterials behave differently than their larger bulk counterparts. Argonne researchers have learned that they are more chemically reactive, exhibit new electronic properties and can be used to create materials that are stronger, tougher and more resistant to friction and wear than bulk materials.
Improved nano-engineered ferroelectric crystals could realize a 50-year-old dream of creating nonvolatile random access memory (NVRAM). The first fruits of it can be seen in Sony's PlayStation 2 and in smart cards now in use in Brazil, China and Japan. A simple wave of a smart card identifies personnel or pays for gas or public transportation.
Computing applications
RAM – random access memory – is used when someone enters information or gives a command to the computer. It can be written to as well as read but – with standard commercial technology – holds its content only while powered by electricity.
Argonne materials scientists have created and are studying nanoscale crystals of ferroelectric materials that can be altered by an electrical field and retain any changes.
Ferroelectric materials – so called, because they behave similarly to ferromagnetic materials even though they don't generally contain iron – consist of crystals whose low symmetry causes spontaneous electrical polarization along one or more of their axes. The application of voltage can change this polarity. Ferroelectric crystals can also change mechanical to electrical energy-the piezoelectric effect - or electrical energy to optical effects.
A strong external electrical field can reverse the plus and minus poles of ferroelectric polarization. The crystals hold their orientation until forced to change by another applied electric field. Thus, they can be coded as binary memory, representing "zero" in one orientation and "one" in the other.
Because the crystals do not revert spontaneously, RAM made with them would not be erased should there be a power failure. Laptop computers would no longer need back-up batteries, permitting them to be made still smaller and lighter. There would be a similar impact on cell phones.
Achieving such permanence is a long-standing dream of the computer industry.
"Companies such as AT&T, Ford, IBM, RCA and Westinghouse Electric made serious efforts to develop non-volatile RAMs in the 1950s, but couldn't achieve commercial use," said Argonne researcher Orlando Auciello. "Back then, NVRAMs were based on expensive ferroelectric single crystals, which required substantial voltage to switch their polarity. This, and cross talk inherent in the then recently devised row matrix address concept, made them impractical.
"Working on the nanoscale changes this," said Auciello. "It means higher density memories with faster speeds and megabyte (the amount of memory needed to store one million characters of information) - or even gigabyte (one billion bytes) - capacity. It's not clear how soon such capacity will be available, but competition is heavy, stakes are high, and some companies claim they will have the first fruits of this research within two years."
II. Find in the text English equivalents to the following Russian words and word combinations. Read them correctly and memorize them.
в реальном времени, недоступный, крошечный, кристаллический диэлектрик, проявлять свойства, сопротивляться трению и износу, усовершенствованный, воплотить в жизнь, энергонезависимое запоминающее устройство, снабжаться электричеством, измениться под влиянием электрического поля, сохранять изменения, стихийная электрическая поляризация, менять направление, нуждаться в батарейной поддержке.
III. Comment on the following statement of the author «Achieving such permanence is a long-standing dream of the computer industry».
IV. Answer the following questions:
1. Why is the creation of nonvolatile random access memory so important?
2. What are the possibilities of ferroelectric materials?
3. Why does the author think that stakes are high? Prove it.
V. Give a summary of the text.