“Nanotechnology is the future of basically everything,” says Prof. Tal Dvir, director of Tel Aviv University’s Jan Koum Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology. “It’s the future of medicine, energy, and computing. Everything is done with the small est building blocks.”
In recent years, nanotechnology, the manipulation of matter on a near-atomic scale to produce new structures, materials, and devices, has assumed a position of importance in virtually all branches of science and technology.
Tel Aviv University’s Koum Center is one of Israel’s leading research centers in this field. Its new three-floor, 8,000-square-meter home on campus in the Roman Abramovich Building for Nano and Quantum Science & Technology heralds a new era in the field of nanotechnology research in Israel and at TAU.
“Everything was designed for the next generation of researchers,” says Dvir, referring to the advanced, state-of-the-art facilities. “We thought about the future when we designed this building.”
The Abramovich Building is the most advanced nanotechnology building in Israel and among the most innovative in the world. The ground floor features the largest clean room in Israel along with other areas for the characterization and fabrication of nanomaterials and nanotechnologies. The building will host thirty scientists working on solutions using nanotechnology, a multidisciplinary field that includes researchers from many different disciplines, including engineering, exact sciences, life sciences and medical sciences, all of whom have their own unique approach to the field.
Moreover, researchers from various universities and companies in the nanotechnology industry will utilize the advanced facilities on the building’s ground floor to fabricate their devices, Dvir says.
“There are close to 100 companies that have come to the university to consult with our engineers and researchers at the nano center when they want to develop new technologies, which they can then take and manufacture on a large scale in their facilities. The design and planning and the initial testing are done together with our staff.”
The upper two floors of the nanotechnology building will provide labs for select professors from across campus. Dvir adds that the multidisciplinary nature of the staff will enable fruitful discussions and interactions between researchers in different disciplines that will increase their creative output.
Some of the exciting nanotechnology research currently being conducted at TAU includes a nanobot project headed by Prof. Dan Peer that sends nano-robots circulating in the bloodstream, targeting and destroying cancerous cells. Another project, led by Prof. Yael Hanein, creates devices that will integrate with the retina to enable blind people to see.
Tel Aviv University’s new nanotechnology gy building has received the generous support of numerous donors, whose named facilities will be unveiled this spring.
The new nanotechnology building will energize TAU’s nano research community, reinforce multidisciplinary research and technological innovation, intensify industry collaboration, and create new connections between the scientific world and society at large.