One result of the new research is that scientists will now be able to exploit the COMPcc portion of a polymer to wrap around a Vitamin D molecule in order to stimulate its tissue-regenerating power. Genetically engineered copolymers have applications in everything from artificial therapeutics, biocatalysts, scaffolds, and cells for medicine, to sustainable energy and environmental remediation. Credit: New York University
Researchers are finding remarkable ways in which bioengineered paired macromolecules can be made to self-assemble, disassemble, and more -- and then biodegrade when they’ve finished their work. The key to these macromolecules -- called block copolymers -- is their ability to self-assemble when exposed to discrete external stimuli. Self-assembly can occur as a function of temperature or pH, for example. And it is not necessarily a permanent change; it can be reversed. Genetically engineered copolymers have applications in everything from artificial therapeutics, biocatalysts, scaffolds, and cells for medicine, to sustainable energy and environmental remediation. For four years, Jin Kim Montclare and researchers at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University have been developing block copolymers from scratch using recombinant DNA and putting them through biochemical hoops. The group’s work, published recently in the journal ChemBioChem, involves block copolymers comprising elastin alternating with COMPcc. The former is a pentapeptide whose amino-acid constituents can assemble into a beta spiral structure as a function of temperature, pH, or salinity. COMPcc, which stands for “cartilage oligomeric matrix protein coil coiled,” is a pentamer arranged as five helixes that can contort into an arrangement that produces a hydrophobic core the way one might create a cylindrical cavity by stacking garden hoses on a deck -- thus the odd “coiled coil” nomenclature. COMPcc has the ability to bind small water-insoluble molecules such as Vitamin D within its hydrophobic core. The possibilities are manifold. “That central pore can potentially bind chemicals that are hard to deliver as drugs because they are normally not water soluble,” says Montclare. For example COMPcc can bind to Vitamin D, a non-dissolving molecule that happens to have profound implications for regenerative tissue and serves as a signaling hormone for the promotion of tissue differentiation into cartilage and bone. And COMPcc can “live” in a copolymer with elastin, synthetics, or other coiled coil-based materials that self-assemble into gels or more organized forms like scaffolding, which can be used for tissue regeneration. Find out more...
Rice Physicists Kill Cancer with 'Nanobubbles'
By using lasers and nanoparticles Jason Hafner, left, and Dmitri Lapotko have discovered a new technique for singling out individual diseased cells and destroying them with tiny explosions. Credit: Jeff Fitlow/Rice University
Using lasers and nanoparticles, scientists at Rice University have discovered a new technique for singling out individual diseased cells and destroying them with tiny explosions. The scientists used lasers to make "nanobubbles" by zapping gold nanoparticles inside cells. In tests on cancer cells, they found they could tune the lasers to create either small, bright bubbles that were visible but harmless or large bubbles that burst the cells. Nanobubbles are created when gold nanoparticles are struck by short laser pulses. The short-lived bubbles are very bright and can be made smaller or larger by varying the power of the laser. Because they are visible under a microscope, nanobubbles can be used to either diagnose sick cells or to track the explosions that are destroying them. In the current study, Lapotko and Rice colleague Jason Hafner, associate professor of physics and astronomy and of chemistry, tested the approach on leukemia cells and cells from head and neck cancers. They attached antibodies to the nanoparticles so they would target only the cancer cells, and they found the technique was effective at locating and killing the cancer cells. Find out more...
Watching Crystals Grow May Lead to Faster Electronic Devices
Conventional theory says when films are being formed at the atomic scale, atoms land on top of each other and form mounds or "islands" and feel an energetic "pull" from other atoms that prevents them from hopping off the island's edges and crystallizing into smooth sheets. The result is rough spots on the thin films used to produce semiconductors. Cornell University-led researchers eliminated this pull by shortening the bonds between their particles. But they still saw particles hesitate at the island's edges.
Image Credit: Rajesh Ganapathy, Sharon Gerbode, Mark Buckley, and Itai Cohen - Cornell University
The quest for faster electronic devices recently got something more than a little bump up in technological knowhow. Scientists at Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. discovered that the thin, smooth, crystalline sheets needed to make semiconductors, which are the foundation of modern computers, might be grown into smoother sheets by managing the random darting motions of the atomic particles that affect how the crystals grow. Led by assistant professor of physics Itai Cohen at Cornell, researchers recreated conditions of layer-by-layer crystalline growth using particles much bigger than atoms, but still small enough that they behave like atoms. Similar to using beach balls to model the behavior of sand, scientists used a solution of tiny plastic spheres 50 times smaller than a human hair to reproduce the conditions that lead to crystallization on the atomic scale. With this precise modeling, they could watch how crystalline sheets grow. Using an optical microscope, the scientists could watch exactly what their "atoms"--actually, micron-sized silica particles suspended in fluid--did as they crystallized. What's more, they were able to manipulate single particles one at a time and test conditions that lead to smooth crystal growth. The video below is sped up by a factor of about 20. Video Credit: John Savage, Rajesh Ganapathy, and Itai Cohen - Cornell University. Find out more...
Nanodragsters Hit the Street
Image Credit: Rice University
The latest work in a series of molecular machines that began with 2005's nanocar has produced what Rice University scientists James Tour and Kevin Kelly call a nanodragster for its characteristic hot-rod shape, with small wheels on a short axle in the front and large wheels on a long axle in the back. Their research is another step toward functional nanomachines that can be custom-built and set to work in microelectronics and other applications. What those wheels are made of matters most. Early nanocars rolled on simple carbon 60 molecules, aka buckyballs. But they were a drag, literally, as they would only turn on a gold surface in high heat, about 200 degrees Celsius. The Rice team found in previous research that wheels made of p-carborane, a cluster of carbon and boron atoms, operate at much lower temperatures. But they're more difficult to image with a scanning tunneling microscope because of their much weaker interaction with metallic surfaces. The key to making nanodragsters was putting p-carborane wheels in the front and buckyballs in the back, getting the advantages of both. The front wheels roll easier, while the buckyballs grip the gold roadway well enough to be imaged. And the vehicle operates at a much lower temperature than previous nanovehicles. Find out more...
Identifying Molecules in Infrared
For the first time, researchers can use infrared spectroscopy to determine what type of bonds protein molecules contain and to identify materials. The new technique has been sought to overcome several limitations of the current, standard technique. Image Credit: Hatice Altug, Electrical Engineering Department, Boston University
An interdisciplinary team of researchers has created a new, ultra-sensitive technique to analyze life-sustaining protein molecules. The technique may profoundly change the methodology of biomolecular studies and chart a new path to effective diagnostics and early treatment of complex diseases. Researchers from Boston University and Tufts University near Boston recently demonstrated an infrared spectroscopy technique that can directly identify the "vibrational fingerprints" of extremely small quantities of proteins, the machinery involved in maintaining living organisms. The new technique exploits nanotechnology to overcome several limitations of current, conventional techniques used to study biomolecules. Previous bio-molecular study methods commonly use fluorescence spectroscopy, where biomolecules are labeled with very bright fluorescence tags to track how efficiently they interact with each other. Understanding interactions is important for medical drug research. Molecules consist of atoms bonded to each other with springs. Depending on the mass of atoms, how stiff these springs are, or how the atoms' springs are arranged, the molecules rotate and vibrate at specific frequencies similar to a guitar string that vibrates at specific frequencies depending on the string length. These resonant frequencies are molecule specific and they mostly occur in the infrared frequency range of the electromagnetic spectrum. The sensitivity of infrared spectroscopy previously had been too low to detect these vibrations, particularly from small quantities of samples. Find out more...
At Stanford, Nanotubes + Ink + Paper = Instant Battery
Stanford University scientists are harnessing nanotechnology to quickly produce ultra-lightweight, bendable batteries and supercapacitors in the form of everyday paper. Simply coating a sheet of paper with ink made of carbon nanotubes and silver nanowires makes a highly conductive storage device, said Yi Cui, assistant professor of materials science and engineering. "Society really needs a low-cost, high-performance energy storage device, such as batteries and simple supercapacitors," he said. Like batteries, capacitors hold an electric charge, but for a shorter period of time. However, capacitors can store and discharge electricity much more rapidly than a battery.
Above: Post doctoral students in the lab of Prof. Yi Cui, Materials Science and Engineering, light up a diode from a battery made from treated paper, similar to what you would find in a copy machine. The paper batteries are treated with a nanotube ink, baked and folded into electrical generating sources like the one wrapped in foil seen here.
(Video Credit: Stanford University)
"These nanomaterials are special," Cui said. "They're a one-dimensional structure with very small diameters." The small diameter helps the nanomaterial ink stick strongly to the fibrous paper, making the battery and supercapacitor very durable. The paper supercapacitor may last through 40,000 charge-discharge cycles – at least an order of magnitude more than lithium batteries. The nanomaterials also make ideal conductors because they move electricity along much more efficiently than ordinary conductors, Cui said. Cui had previously created nanomaterial energy storage devices using plastics. His new research shows that a paper battery is more durable because the ink adheres more strongly to paper (answering the question, "Paper or plastic?"). Find out more...
Nanowires Key to Future Transistors, Electronics
As depicted in this illustration, tiny particles of a gold-aluminum alloy were alternately heated and cooled inside a vacuum chamber, and then silicon and germanium gases were alternately introduced. As the gold-aluminum bead absorbed the gases, it became "supersaturated" with silicon and germanium, causing them to precipitate and form wires. (Image Source: Purdue University, Birck Nanotechnology Center/Seyet LLC)
A new generation of ultrasmall transistors and more powerful computer chips using tiny structures called semiconducting nanowires is closer to reality after a key discovery by researchers at IBM, Purdue University and the University of California at Los Angeles. The researchers have learned how to create nanowires with layers of different materials that are sharply defined at the atomic level, which is a critical requirement for making efficient transistors out of the structures. "Having sharply defined layers of materials enables you to improve and control the flow of electrons and to switch this flow on and off," said Eric Stach, an associate professor of materials engineering at Purdue. Electronic devices are often made of "heterostructures," meaning they contain sharply defined layers of different semiconducting materials, such as silicon and germanium. Until now, however, researchers have been unable to produce nanowires with sharply defined silicon and germanium layers. Instead, this transition from one layer to the next has been too gradual for the devices to perform optimally as transistors. The new findings point to a method for creating nanowire transistors. Whereas conventional transistors are made on flat, horizontal pieces of silicon, the silicon nanowires are "grown" vertically. Because of this vertical structure, they have a smaller footprint, which could make it possible to fit more transistors on an integrated circuit, or chip, Stach said. New technologies will be needed for industry to maintain Moore's law, an unofficial rule stating that the number of transistors on a computer chip doubles about every 18 months, resulting in rapid progress in computers and telecommunications. Doubling the number of devices that can fit on a computer chip translates into a similar increase in performance. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to continue shrinking electronic devices made of conventional silicon-based semiconductors . Find out more...
New Study Confirms Exotic Electric Properties of Graphene
This illustration shows the tip of a scanning tunneling microscope approaching an undulating sheet of perfect graphene. The exotic substance is 10 times stronger than steel and conducts electricity better than any known material at room temperature. Both physicists and nanoscientists are studying graphene and exploring its potential applications. (Image Source: Vanderbilt Univeristy; Image Credit: Calvin Davidson, British Carbon Group)
First, it was the soccer-ball-shaped molecules dubbed buckyballs. Then it was the cylindrically shaped nanotubes. Now there is graphene: a remarkably flat molecule made of carbon atoms arranged in hexagonal rings much like molecular chicken wire. It is 10 times stronger than steel and conducts electricity better than any other known material at room temperature. These and graphene’s other exotic properties have attracted the interest of physicists, who want to study them, and nanotechnologists, who want to exploit them to make novel electrical and mechanical devices. Although graphene is the first truly two-dimensional crystalline material that has been discovered, over the years scientists have put considerable thought into how two-dimensional gases and solids should behave. They have also succeeded in creating a close approximation to a two-dimensional electron gas by bonding two slightly different semiconductors together. Electrons are confined to the interface between the two and their motions are restrained to two dimensions. When such a system is cooled down to less than one degree above absolute zero and a strong magnetic field is applied, then the fractional quantum Hall effect appears. Since scientists figured out how to make graphene five years ago, they have been trying to get it to exhibit this effect with only marginal success. The best way to understand it is to think of the electrons in graphene as a forming a (very thin) sea of charge. When the magnetic field is applied, it generates whirlpools in the electron fluid. Because electrons carry a negative charge, these vortices have a positive charge. Find out more...
Tiny Light Beam Budges Nanoscale Object
Scanning electron micrograph of two thin, flat rings of silicon nitride, each 190 nanometers thick and mounted a millionth of a meter apart. Under the right conditions optical forces between the two rings are enough to bend the thin spokes and pull the rings toward one another, changing their resonances enough to act as an optical switch. Image Credit: Cornell Nanophotonics Group
With a bit of leverage, researchers have used a very tiny beam of light with as little as 1 milliwatt of power to move a silicon structure up to 12 nanometers. That’s enough to completely switch the optical properties of the structure from opaque to transparent, they report.
The technology could have applications in the design of nanoscale devices with moving parts—known as micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS)—and micro-optomechanical systems (MOMS), which combine moving parts with photonic circuits, says Michal Lipson, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Cornell University. Light can be thought of as a stream of particles that can exert a force on whatever they strike. The sun doesn’t knock you off your feet because the force is very small, but at the nanoscale it can be significant. “The challenge is that large optical forces are required to change the geometry of photonic structures,” Lipson explained. Find out more...
Nano-scale Drug Delivery For Chemotherapy
Mouse tumor cells stain red, showing penetration of anti-cancer drug after 24 hours. Image Credit: Pratt School of Engineering, Duke University
Going smaller could bring better results, especially when it comes to cancer-fighting drugs. Duke University bioengineers have developed a simple and inexpensive method for loading cancer drug payloads into nano-scale delivery vehicles and demonstrated in animal models that this new nanoformulation can eliminate tumors after a single treatment. After delivering the drug to the tumor, the delivery vehicle breaks down into harmless byproducts, markedly decreasing the toxicity for the recipient. Nano-delivery systems have become increasingly attractive to researchers because of their ability to efficiently get into tumors. Since blood vessels supplying tumors are more porous, or leaky, than normal vessels, the nanoformulation can more easily enter and accumulate within tumor cells. This means that higher doses of the drug can be delivered, increasing its cancer-killing abilities while decreasing the side effects associated with systematic chemotherapy. Find out more...
Nanotechnology Takes Off!
From Lawrence Berkeley National Labs to Silicon Valley, researchers are manipulating particles at the atomic level, ushering in potential cures for cancer, clothes that do not stain, and solar panels as thick as a sheet of paper. View the video below!
Nanotech Europe as organized by a comprehensive consortium of partners, including Agent-D, the coordination group of the Centers of Competence of Nanotechnology in Germany in cooperation with the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Germany) and several international partners. Image Credit: Nanotech Europe
Nanotech Europe, which concluded on September 30th, attracted over 600 participants from 50 countries, as well as 64 companies. The event brought together entrepreneurial start-ups and innovative corporations, world-class science, and representatives from government and funding bodies to advance the development of nanotechnology. It provided a forum to address critical success factors for nanotechnology including dialogue between organizations and across industry boundaries, directing public and private sector investment to support innovation, and management of complex industry needs. The event covered a wide range of nanotechnology research and development, including technologies for cancer detection and treatment, high-efficiency solar cells, water purification, high density data storage, novel electronic and photonic devices, and many other life-improving innovations. Nanotech Europe also featured firms in a wide range of industrial sectors discussing their needs from nanotechnology:; Nokia, Shell, Daimler, Thales, Fiat, Bayer and many others discussed their activities and how they see nanotechnology affecting their industry. Find out more...
Better Brain Implants Using Conducting Polymer Nanotubes
This illustration depicts neurons firing (green structures in the foreground) and communicating with nanotubes in the background. Illustration courtesy of Mohammad Reza Abidian
Brain implants that can more clearly record signals from surrounding neurons in rats have been created at the University of Michigan. The findings could eventually lead to more effective treatment of neurological disorders such as Parkinson's disease and paralysis. Neural electrodes must work for time periods ranging from hours to years. When the electrodes are implanted, the brain first reacts to the acute injury with an inflammatory response. Then the brain settles into a wound-healing, or chronic, response. It's during this secondary response that brain tissue starts to encapsulate the electrode, cutting it off from communication with surrounding neurons. The new brain implants developed at U-M are coated with nanotubes made of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT), a biocompatible and electrically conductive polymer that has been shown to record neural signals better than conventional metal electrodes. U-M researchers found that PEDOT nanotubes enhanced high-quality unit activity (signal-to-noise ratio >4) about 30 percent more than the uncoated sites. They also found that based on in vivo impedance data, PEDOT nanotubes might be used as a novel method for biosensing to indicate the transition between acute and chronic responses in brain tissue. Find out more...
IBM Scientists First to Image the 'Anatomy' of a Molecule
Imaging the "anatomy" of a pentacene molecule - 3D rendered view: By using a sharp metal tip terminated with a carbon monoxide molecule, scientists measured in the short-range regime of forces to obtain an image of the inner structure of the molecule. The colored surface represents experimental data. Image courtesy of IBM Research – Zurich
IBM scientists have been able to image the "anatomy" -- or chemical structure -- inside a molecule with unprecedented resolution, using a complex technique known as noncontact atomic force microscopy. The results push the exploration of using molecules and atoms at the smallest scale and could greatly impact the field of nanotechnology, which seeks to understand and control some of the smallest objects known to mankind. "Though not an exact comparison, if you think about how a doctor uses an x-ray to image bones and organs inside the human body, we are using the atomic force microscope to image the atomic structures that are the backbones of individual molecules," said IBM Researcher Gerhard Meyer. "Scanning probe techniques offer amazing potential for prototyping complex functional structures and for tailoring and studying their electronic and chemical properties on the atomic scale." Find out more...
Looking deeply into polymer solar cells
3D Electron tomography image of a polymer-metal oxide solar cell. The 3D nanoscopic morphology shows the interpenetrating metal oxide network in (yellow) inside a polymer matrix (black). Image Source: Eindhoven University of Technology
Researchers from the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) have made the first high-resolution 3D images of the inside of a polymer solar cell. This gives them important new insights in the nanoscale structure of a polymer solar cell and the effect on its performance. The research was a joint effort of TU/e-researchers and colleagues at the University of Ulm, Germany. The investigations shed new light on the operational principles of polymer solar cells. This is expected to be very important for the development of better polymer solar cells. Polymer solar cells do not have the high efficiencies of their silicon counterparts yet. Polymer cells, however, can be printed in roll-to-roll processes, at very high speeds, which makes the technology potentially very cost-effective. Added to that, polymer cells are flexible and lightweight, and therefore suitable to be used on vehicles or clothing or to be incorporated in the design of objects. In these hybrid solar cells, a mixture of two different materials, a polymer and a metal oxide are used to create charges at their interface when the mixture is illuminated by the sun. Find out more...
IBM Scientists Use DNA Scaffolding To Build Tiny Circuit Boards
IBM scientists are using DNA origami to build tiny circuit boards; in this image, low concentrations of triangular DNA origami are binding to wide lines on a lithographically patterned surface. Credit:IBM
Scientists at IBM Research and the California Institute of Technology have announced a scientific advancement that could be a major breakthrough in enabling the semiconductor industry to pack more power and speed into tiny computer chips, while making them more energy efficient and less expensive to manufacture. They made an advancement in combining lithographic patterning with self assembly – a method to arrange DNA origami structures on surfaces compatible with today’s semiconductor manufacturing equipment. Today, the semiconductor industry is faced with the challenges of developing lithographic technology for feature sizes smaller than 22 nm and exploring new classes of transistors that employ carbon nanotubes or silicon nanowires. IBM’s approach of using DNA molecules as scaffolding -- where millions of carbon nanotubes could be deposited and self-assembled into precise patterns by sticking to the DNA molecules – may provide a way to reach sub-22 nm lithography. The utility of this approach lies in the fact that the positioned DNA nanostructures can serve as scaffolds, or miniature circuit boards, for the precise assembly of components – such as carbon nanotubes, nanowires and nanoparticles – at dimensions significantly smaller than possible with conventional semiconductor fabrication techniques. This opens up the possibility of creating functional devices that can be integrated into larger structures, as well as enabling studies of arrays of nanostructures with known coordinates. Find out more...
POSTECH Synthesizes Nanometer-thin Lens
POSTECH's research team, led by chemistry professor Kim Kwang-soo, said it has successfully synthesized lenses that are hundreds of times thinner than a single hair. The team discovered a new physics phenomenon. When the size of a lens shrinks to the level of the wavelength of light, it shows the ultra-resolution that thinner things than the half wavelength of light could be distinguished. The half-wavelength of light is theoretically limiting value of diffraction in traditional geometrical optics. Kim's team found that the organic matter Calix Hydro Quinon can shape a nanometer-thin cross-sectioned convex lens. The team found an ultra-refraction for the first time in which a light-wavelength-thin lens makes the light draw a curve through diffraction and interference and makes the nano-lens have a very short focal distance. The team proved the intriguing optical phenomenon of the nano-lens through the precise simulation of electromagnetic waves and established a new physical phenomenon theory. The optical features of a nanometer-thin lens can be used to analyze structures of nano and micro-bio substances, to improve technologies for the development of nano components, and to integrate light that is impossible to observe with traditional optical microscopes. Nanometerthin lenses can be also used for the development of next-generation nano-optical memories and detection components. The success of the research resulted from cooperation between academics in chemistry, physics, and mechanical and electronic engineering. Find out more...
Nanoparticles Explored for Preventing Cell Damage
Sudipta Seal, materials scientist and engineer at the University of Central Florida, holds a bottle containing billions of ultra-small, engineered nanoceria. Credit:Sudipta Seal, University of Central Florida
Sudipta Seal is enthralled by nanoparticles, particularly those of a rare earth metal called cerium. The particles are showing potential for a wide range of applications, from medicine to energy. Seal is a professor of materials science and engineering at the University of Central Florida (UCF), and several years ago, he and his colleagues engineered nanoparticles of cerium oxide (CeO2), a material long used in ceramics, catalysts, and fuel cells. The novel nanocrystalline form is non-toxic and biocompatible--ideal for medical applications. Since then, the researchers found that cerium oxide nanoparticles have two additional medical benefits: they behave like an antioxidant, protecting cells from oxidative stress, and they can be fine-tuned to potentially deliver medical treatments directly into cells. Find out more...
Nanosolar Looks to the Sun with Nanotechnology
Hoping to leave today's silicon solar cells behind, the Palo Alto company Nanosolar is creating paper-thin solar panels harnessing nanotechnology, a product that could revolutionize solar power. View the video below!
Semiconductor Research Corporation (SRC), a university-research consortium for semiconductors and related technologies, has teamed with the National Science Foundation (NSF) to announce funding of $2 million in new supplemental grants for nanoelectronics research. Researchers at six major NSF centers inside leading U.S. universities will contribute to the goal of finding a replacement for the transistor - the foundational building block of computing technology for decades - and discovering a new digital switching mechanism using nanoelectronics innovation. In electronics, a transistor is a semiconductor device commonly used to amplify or switch electronic signals. A transistor is made of a solid piece of a semiconductor material, with at least three terminals for connection to an external circuit. A voltage or current applied to one pair of the transistor's terminals changes the current flowing through another pair of terminals. Until recently, manufacturers were able to double the number of transistors on a chip at half the power for each transistor by shrinking them smaller and smaller in each new generation of semiconductor technology. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to continue decreasing the power needed to turn the device off and on, making it difficult to continue the pace of product innovation from scaling alone. Find out more...
Stream of Sand Behaves Like Water
In this high speed video of a freely falling granular stream, viewers see a specially designed camera apparatus move alongside an initial acceleration period and track the formation of grain clusters, similar to the formation of droplets for a water stream falling from a faucet.
Credit: John Royer and Heinrich Jaeger, The University of Chicago
University of Chicago researchers recently showed that dry granular materials such as sands, seeds and grains have properties similar to liquid, forming water-like droplets when poured from a given source. The finding could be important to a wide range of industries that use "fluidized" dry particles for oil refining, plastics manufacturing, and pharmaceutical production. Researchers previously thought dry particles lacked sufficient surface tension to form droplets like ordinary liquids. But, in a new experiment, physicists from the Materials Research Science and Engineering Center at the University of Chicago, measured nanoscale forces that cause droplet formation using a special co-moving apparatus devised for a high-speed, $80,000 camera that captures images much like a skydiver might photograph a fellow jumper in free fall. They observed falling 100-micrometer-diameter glass beads, or streaming sand, and found that forces as much as 100,000 times smaller than those that produce surface tension in ordinary liquids could cause droplet formation in granular streams and cause these dry streams to behave like an ultra-low-surface-tension liquid. Find out more...
London Travel -- in Miniature
The London Nanotube was laser etched on low reflective chrome coated glass. The map is just under 2x3 mm and each line around 12.5 micron wide. Image Source: Bio Nano Consulting
Researchers at Bio Nano Consulting (BNC), a specialist bio-nanotechnology product development consultancy, have produced a miniaturized version of the London tube map, measuring only 2x3 mm – about the size of a pinhead. The map was etched using specialised lasers by Dr Richard Winkle, a BNC researcher at Imperial College London, whilst testing the capabilities of an Oxford Lasers micromachining system. The ‘London Nanotube’ was aptly named as nanotubes are an essential building block for nanotechnology. Dr Mike Fisher, Business development Director of Bio Nano Consulting commented, “This version of the London Nanotube is not strictly on the nanoscale, so we are taking on this challenge. Using our state-of-the-art micro and nanofabrication equipment, we believe we can shrink the tube map another 100 times, making it invisible to the naked eye.” Find out more...
