Iranian researchers, growing interest in Nano

Over 3,750 students and researchers took part in the competition on Friday. In this competition, participants from all over Iran competed with each other in 12 centers in the cities of Tehran, Zanjan, Arak, Shiraz, Minab, Sirjan, Ahvaz, Isfahan, Tabriz, and Fooman. Two centers for men and one center for women had been set up in the city of Tehran. Director of the Second Nanotechnology National Competition Ali Reza Alami said the number of participants in this competition showed a significant growth in comparison with the previous year's competition, and continued, "More than 3750 participants took part in the Second Nanotechnology National Competition, among which 55.5% were females and 44.5% were males." By stating that the topics of the Second Nanotechnology National Competition had been changed, Mr Alami added, "There existed only the topics related to the methods and identification and analysis devices in the previous year's competition, while a number of topics including applications of nanotechnology and methods to produce and synthesize the nanostructures have been added to the topics in this year's competition." The Second Nanotechnology National Competition consisted of 120 multiple choice questions and the participants were required to pass the examination in 90 minutes. In addition to the multiple choice questions, there were three descriptive questions for the applicants who wanted to acquire teaching capability certificate. Participants would obtain teaching capability certificate in case they could get at least 60% score in the scientific examination, and in case they gave appropriate answers to the descriptive questions.