Abstract:
Nanomaterials have become a gold mine for research in the eld of materials science, owing
to the incredible variety of novel and technologically desirable properties that one can get
out of materials by a reduction in size. Nanomaterials are materials which are restricted to
nanometric size in one, two or three dimensions. These include zero dimensional materials
like molecules, clusters and nanoparticles [1, 2], one dimensional materials like nanowires,
nanotubes and nanoribbons [3{6], two dimensional materials like graphene and surface
alloys [7, 8], as well as three dimensional nanostructured materials like nanocomposites
[9]. These nanomaterials present a large scope for nding new properties that might be
completely di erent from those of conventional bulk materials. To cite just a couple of
examples, gold nanoparticle suspensions are known to show colors ranging from red to
violet depending on the particle size, and gold and palladium metal nanoparticles become
magnetic in contrast to the nonmagnetic bulk [10]. Two dimensional (2D) materials like
graphene have led to new ways of structuring materials, and have also led to considerable
theoretical advances [11, 12]. In nanomaterials like surface alloys, the traditional rules
governing the formation of bulk alloys are no longer valid, and the formation of new
surface alloy phases, and novel stabilization mechanisms are possible [8].
