Nanotechnology World Conference 2026

Abstract

Due to the extremely fascinating and useful chemical and physical properties, nanomaterials exhibit an interest in many fields of applications such as photonics and sensor technology, biomedicine and biotechnology, environmental protection, production of paints and varnishes, textiles, footwear, packaging, electronics, aerospace and automotive, etc. Until today, nanotechnology has already contributed to the number of innovative products in various engineering disciplines. In the European market, many products containing nanomaterials, e.g., batteries, coatings, antibacterial textiles, cosmetics, food products, are already present.

Although nanomaterials, on the one hand, offer technical and commercial opportunities and challenges, on the other hand, they can pose a risk to the environment and raise concerns about the health and safety of humans and animals, as regulation of nanomaterials is debated and many questions related to the risks of exposure to nanomaterials are still unanswered.

This lecture will introduce some recent examples from our Research Group demonstrating the use and challenges that may be tackled by functional nanomaterials, and some risks will be briefly mentioned:   

1. In the Safety and protection as an optical chemical sensor for food quality control, detection and protection against UV radiation, and toxic organophosphates and MeHg.

Optical chemical sensors based on mesoporous silica (SiO₂) and titania (TiO₂) nanomaterial became very widespread in the last decades and rely on the use of sol gel materials, which include e.g. indicators, dyes and other additives.

Our group recently developed a variety of novel sol gel materials in the form of spherical nanoparticles and thin films containing specific dyes which enable more reliable sensing of important parameters such as oxygen, temperature, pH, etc., which will be presented together with the sensing requirements of sensitivity, selectivity, stability, etc. 4, 5

1. In the  Health as an optical chemical sensors for the detection of disease states in vitro and in vivo,

Furthermore, mesoporous silica (SiO₂) nanoparticles have attracted much attention the last decade in nanomedicine applications due to their biocompatibility, flexible functionalization, tunable pore size and diameter. In addition to the fine control of their size, shape, and pore structures, incorporation of drugs, dyes or indicators is important for their therapeutic applications. Our recent results on the synthesis and functionalization of various types of superparamagnetic nanoparticles (core shell ) and mesoporous silica nanoparticles having different pore sizes, containing therapeutic agents and dyes, will be presented.