Agri Kultuur November 2018 | Page 15

applications are equally diverse, ranging from extensions of conventional device physics to completely new approaches based upon molecular self-assembly, from developing new materials with dimensions on the nanoscale to direct control of matter on the atomic scale. Scientists currently debate the future implications of nanotechnology. Nanotechnology may be able to create many new materials and devices with a vast range of applications, such as in nanomedicine, nano-electronics, biomaterials energy production, and consumer products. On the other hand, nanotechnology raises many of the same issues as any new technology, including concerns about the toxicity and environmental impact of nanomaterials, and their potential effects on global economics, as well as speculation about various doomsday scenarios. These concerns have led to a debate among advocacy groups and governments on whether special regulation of nanotechnology is justified. AgriKultuur |AgriCulture The Application of Nanotechnology in Aquaculture: Application of microbubble generators to aquaculture was studied in the 1980s because various farms including shellfish culture and fish culture suffered from shortage of oxygen supply due to high-density culturing. Prof Hirofumi Ohnari, Tokuyama College of Technology in Japan, invented a microbubble generator and used it to control DO levels of the water in an oyster farm in Hiroshima Bay, in Seto Inland Sea. His original microbubble generator adopts a nozzle that creates a “Rotational Flow of the water” in the nozzle, using a water pump and produces microbubbles, breaking the air leading to the centre of the rotational flow of the water. He demonstrated that the addition of microbubbles is very effective to add oxygen to the water of the oyster farm, and this technology drew the attention of many researchers, and various types of microbubble generators have been invented in the last decade in Japan. 15