CHEMISTS in India have found a simple way to make 鈥渘anotubes鈥� out of
ceramics. The hollow tubes, only 40 nanometres in diameter, could be used to
build microscopic circuits and devices.
Almost all nanotubes made so far have been carbon 鈥渂uckytubes鈥�, tubular
variants of the football-shaped carbon molecule called buckminsterfullerene. Now
Ram Rao and his colleagues at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore
describe how they made the first ever zirconium oxide nanotubes in Chemical
Communications (issue 16, p 1581).
After treating carbon nanotubes with acid, Ram coats them with a gel
containing zirconium oxide. He then bakes off all the carbon within, leaving
only the outer shell of ceramic. Ram has already made conducting nanotubes out
of ruthenium oxide. 鈥淭his technique is very simple, using the carbon nanotubes
as templates,鈥� says Rao.
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