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Nanoparticles also are akin to nanometer-size minerals produced naturally by some bacteria , which are of interest as possible telltale signs of life on other planets.Last year , Gilbert , Banfield , research scientist Hengzhong Zhang and their colleagues reported that the crystal structure of nanoparticles made of the semiconducting material zinc sulfide ( or zinc sulphide , ZnS ) changes when it gets wet , which means surface interactions have a large effect throughout the nanoparticle.The scientists ' latest findings reinforce that message . This makes the transition of the semiconducting material to a semimetal at still higher pressures probable . Anquetil says they have made polymers that act as pressure sensors , and they see the possibility of using semiconducting polymers as the basis for simple electric switches . They then examined possible sources of the effect , showing that it is not the result of intrinsic coupling but rather a form of scattering that did not depend on the nature of the semiconducting material used . Organic thin-film transistor ( OTFT ) technology involves the use of organic semiconducting compounds in electronic components , notably computer displays . While a number of studies have been made on the use of semiconducting SWNTs for field effect transistors ( FET ) , little progress has been achieved for the use of another important feature of semiconductors , namely , optoelectronics such as photoelectric conversion and electroluminescence . For example , the study reveals that a model proposed by Bachilo et al. for predicting RBMs of isolated semiconducting tubes does not hold for large diameter tubes DFT methods give a detailed picture of variation in the structural , mechanical , and electonic properties of both C and BN nanotubes as a function of their radius , chirality , and interactions .