Scanning Probe Microscopies

In the 1990s, there was a considerable development in molecular chemistry through super- and supra-supermolecular stages. These featured large molecular arrays, from interlocked organic macromolecules, nanotubes, dendrimers, polyphenylenes, and many others - especially self-assembling molecules (SAM) - in repeating units in the 5 – 100 nm range. Simultaneously, materials science, and especially electronics, is still going down from microns to nanometers through utilisation of ever-shorter wavelengths in beam lithographies on substrates, especially silicon ones. In addition, unconventional fabrication methods for patterning nanostructures (again for electronics and optoelectronics) are also emerging, at the same time overlapping with other fields where mesoscopic order is responsible for function, such as bio-ordering (shells, plate ordering in animal shells and wings, DNA-derived assemblies, and so on).