Plenary lecture 3: “Recent progress in developments of single-nano diamond particles”

After 45 years of unfortunate delay, nanodiamond particles having 4.8±0.7 nm in diameter are now emerging as one of the most promising candidates for a general purpose material in nanotechnology for the reasons of (1) low cost, (2) non-toxicity, (3) high crystallinity, and (4) versatile maneuverability. (1) The raw material is a TNT-based war explosive, once most popular, over-produced but now becoming out-of-date. (2) Complete absence of cytotoxicity for a variety of cell types has been proved by the work of Dai/Schrand. (3) ‘Diamond is forever.’ (4) Single-nano diamond particles are soluble in water and a few organic solvents to give transparent and stable colloidal solution, hence can be derivatized by homogeneous reaction. Crude agglutinates of detonation nanodiamond have been produced in the past decade on the scale of few tons a year but last year test production of dispersed SND began in Japan.