Nanostructures

The second chapter brings forth the types and classifications of nanostructures. There are multiple categories in which nanomaterials can be put into. Based on classical materials definition of metals, polymers and ceramics, most of the nanomaterials can be fitted into this broad category. At nanoscale, structures not only get affected significantly by size ranges but also by their shapes. The concept of dimensionality covers a very wide assortment of nanostructures into dimensional structures namely 0D, 1D, 2D, and finally 3D. Nano might not just mandate the size of the material microstructure to be in nanoscale, even the cellular size of many porous materials can also be tuned to various magnitudes of nanoscale. Many useful analogies, illustrations, and mathematical relations would help the reader to understand the nitty-gritty of nanostructures in various materials. At many places, comparisons have been drawn between conventional materials and the advanced nano materials. This is useful for knowing about the nanostructural materials vis-a-vis microstructural or macrostructural materials. Very exciting new constructs of nanostructures are explained in this chapter.