Nanoscience has been promoted as a major technological revolution, and yet its influence outside of the laboratory has been relatively small. From our survey of recent progress, we conclude that as nanoscience fragments into subdisciplines and researchers become ever more specialized, there is increasingly little advancement toward the emergence of research themes that may unite and elevate nanoscience toward having an impact of the magnitude achieved by the steam engine, electricity, medicine, and the Internet. We suggest that one avenue for nanoscience to break this impasse is to venture beyond static structures into domain of dynamic nanomaterials that organize and/or function when displaced from thermodynamic equilibrium. We highlight recent work from our laboratory in this emerging area and also suggest some possible future applications for responsive and nonequilibrium nanosystems/materials.

Poly(ethylene-co-1-butene) diffusion in ethane, propane, butane, and pentane indicates that ethane solutions are remarkably different. For propane, butane, and pentane the dynamic second virial coefficient, k D, is negative near the phase boundary, increases rapidly to positive values within ∼100 to 200 bar of the respective phase boundary, and approaches a constant value at high pressures. For ethane, k D is also negative near the phase boundary; it increases at a slower rate and becomes only slightly greater than zero. k D for all four solvents superpose when plotted against “methyl” molar density, suggesting thermodynamic interactions rather than hydrodynamic forces dominate. For propane, butane, and pentane the hydrodynamic radius, R H, also starts at a low value near the phase boundary and increases to the same value for all three alkanes. For ethane R H is ∼30% smaller than those for the higher alkanes, reflecting the poor quality of ethane even 1000 bar above the phase boundary.