Nano tech. is 2000 years old in India

Indian craftsmen have used nanotechnology extensively about 2000 years ago for making weapons and long lasting cave paintings withou knowing that they were practising a technology which is going to be in future.

Nobel laureate Robert Curl Jr has said while studying the famous Damascus blades used in the sword of Tipu Sultan and Ajanta Paintings, carbon nano particles were found in both.

On the sword scientists found carbon nanotubes, cylindrical arrangements of carbon atoms first discovered in 1991 and now made in laboratories all over the world.

"Our ancestors have been unwittingly using the technology for over 2,000 years and carbon nano for about 500 years. Carbon nanotechnology is much older than carbon nanoscience," Curl said at the 95th Indian Science Congress being held in Vizag.

The 74-year-old scientist from the US shared the 1996 Nobel Prize for Chemistry with Richard Smalley and Harold Kroto for the discovery of the carbon cage compounds, known as fullerenes.

Indian craftsmen used unique smelting techniques to manufacture the Damascus blades which led to nanotisation giving them a unique long-lasting edge.