Latest Nature Nanotechnology Stories
They said it could be done and now they've done it. What's more, they did it with a GRIN. A team of researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California, Berkeley, have carried out the first experimental demonstration of GRIN "“ for gradient index "“ plasmonics, a hybrid technology that opens the door to a wide range of exotic optics, including superfast computers based on light rather than electronic...
Researchers first to use tiny transistors to detect the kinetics of DNA-DNA bindingAn interdisciplinary team from Columbia University that includes electrical engineers from Columbia's Engineering School, together with researchers from the University's departments of Physics and Chemistry, has figured out a way to study single-molecule interactions on very short time scales using nanoscale transistors. In a paper to be published online January 23 in Nature Nanotechnology, they show how, for...
They say it's the little things that count, and that certainly holds true for the channels in transmembrane proteins, which are small enough to allow ions or molecules of a certain size to pass through, while keeping out larger objects. Artificial fluidic nanochannels that mimic the capabilities of transmembrane proteins are highly prized for a number of advanced technologies. However, it has been difficult to make individual artificial channels of this size "“ until now.Researchers with...
Natelson Lab pioneers technique to measure heat, dissipation at very small scalesYou can touch a functioning light bulb and know right away that it's hot. Ouch! But you can't touch a single molecule and get the same feedback.Rice University researchers say they have the next best thing -- a way to determine the temperature of a molecule or flowing electrons by using Raman spectroscopy combined with an optical antenna.A new paper from the lab of Douglas Natelson, a Rice professor of physics...
The twisting, ladder-like form of the DNA molecule"”the architectural floor plan of life"”contains a universe of information critical to human health. Enormous effort has been invested in deciphering the genetic code, including, most famously, the Human Genome Project. Nevertheless, the process of reading some three-billion nucleotide "letters" to reveal an individual's full genome remains a costly and complex undertaking.Now biophysicist Stuart Lindsay, of the Biodesign...
Smoothing the edgesResearchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a new "templated growth" technique for fabricating nanometer-scale graphene devices. The method addresses what had been a significant obstacle to the use of this promising material in future generations of high-performance electronic devices.The technique involves etching patterns into the silicon carbide surfaces on which epitaxial graphene is grown. The patterns serve as templates directing the...
The enigmatic Möbius strip has long been an object of fascination, appearing in numerous works of art, most famously a woodcut by the Dutchman M.C. Escher, in which a tribe of ants traverses the form's single, never-ending surface.Scientists at the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University's and Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, led by Hao Yan and Yan Liu, have now reproduced the shape on a remarkably tiny scale, joining up braid-like segments of DNA to create Möbius...
Research demonstrates progress towards DNA strand sequencingResearch published this week in Nature Nanotechnology shows a new method of enzyme-controlled movement of a single strand of DNA through a protein nanopore. The paper, by researchers at the University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC), represents a key step towards nanopore sequencing of DNA strands.The publication describes the observation of single stranded DNA (ssDNA) as it translocates through a protein nanopore, alpha hemolysin...
Intensity increases 1,000-fold in Rice lab's experimentEverybody who's ever used a TV, radio or cell phone knows what an antenna does: It captures the aerial signals that make those devices practical. A lab at Rice University has built an antenna that captures light in the same way, at a small scale that has big potential.Condensed matter physicist Doug Natelson and graduate student Dan Ward have found a way to make an optical antenna from two gold tips separated by a nanoscale gap that...
As industries and consumers increasingly seek improved battery power sources, cutting-edge microscopy performed at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory is providing an unprecedented perspective on how lithium-ion batteries function.A research team led by ORNL's Nina Balke, Stephen Jesse and Sergei Kalinin has developed a new type of scanning probe microscopy called electrochemical strain microscopy (ESM) to examine the movement of lithium ions through a battery's cathode...
