Nanotechnology - Nanofood: An Introduction

What is Nanotechnology?

Nanotechnology deals with the creation or manipulation of materials on a very small scale, the nanometre (nm). Do give you an Idea what we are talking about: One of your hairs is approximately 70,000 nm in diameter, whereas a nanoparticle has a size somewhere between 0.5 and 5 nm.

The next question you are probably asking yourself by now is: If these particles are so small, what can they actually do? Actually these nanoparticles are quite capable. Compared to bigger particles they have special chemical and physical properties like, for example, higher reactivity. Because they have a relatively large surface area.

What is Nano-Food?

While there are nanoparticles naturally found in food like milk, the term nano-food is generally used to describe food that has been in contact with nanotechnology. Even though nanotechnology in food is rather new, there are already nanotechnological influenced products in our supermarket aisles like ketchup, which often contains silica dioxide particles to maintain the consistency.

What scientists are working on right now:

- nanoparticles in mayonnaise, in order to make it less fat

- nanoparticles in packaging, so the milk carton turns red when the milk is no longer drinkable  

Why is Nano-Food interesting?

Everybody has to eat. That alone should be enough reason for us to find nano-food highly fascinating. Whether we like it or not, whether it is healthy or not, whether it changes the food world completely or not: It is going play a huge part in our future. 



Sources:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/nanotechnology/what.htmhttp://www.theguardian.com/what-is-nano/what-you-need-know-about-nano-food#start-of-commentshttp://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/wait-theres-nanotechnology-in-my-food-16510737
http://www.planet-wissen.de/natur_technik/forschungszweige/nanotechnologie/nanofood.jsp

Say no to ADA's!!!

PSA against after-death avatars – TV commercial:

1^st scene: Funeral of a young girl. Everybody offers their condolences to the family.

The camera zooms in on her best friend standing on the side, separated from all the other people. She obviously is very sad and pale, no tears. She looks straight to the grave and talks to nobody.

2^nd scene: We see the same girl in her room looking through the facebook page of her dead best friend. Suddenly she notices an eterni.me add on the side. She clicks on the link.

3^rd scene: We can see the girl, now happy again, and the after-death avatar of her best friend walking in a park. The other people in the park, some of them are familiar from the funeral, look at her like she needs to be in the closed psychiatric wing. The camera zooms out and we see other couples like her and her best friend.

4^th scene: It is night, all the post-death avatars from before and some others have now changed into zombie like creatures. They obviously just slaughtered a whole city and are on the move to the next one.

5^th scene: Black. In a white fond it says across the screen: “Stop the apocalypse! Say no to ADA’s!!!”

A day in the life of... mine - a picture chronicle

200 decibel loud snoring woke me up. I cautiously collected my stuff and left the hostel. At nine am, Galway seemed to be just waking up: shops were being opened, waste bins were being emptied and the streets were being cleaned up. Two hours of sightseeing later, I had been to the St. Nicholas Cathedral, walked down Kirwan’s Lane and almost missed the not so special Spanish Arch. Now that the sun was standing high, I crossed the bridge and went to the beach to kill the remaining hour until my bus towards Dublin would leave. Smiling towards the sun, I had to think of Philipp, who had promised me nothing but bad weather. Only seconds later, I needed all my strength standing against the strong wind. At the same time, I got slapped in the face by heavy rain, hail and salt water. I found myself soaking wet within ten minutes, which left me no other choice than to return to the hostel and beg for them to let me into their bathroom again. Inspecting the damage, I gave up and pulled on the only try piece of clothing left: my pyjamas. Three and a half hour later, everyone on the backed Friday afternoon bus had asked me about my clothes.