From the category archives:

Nanoscience

Templates for atomically precise
metal-oxide nanostructures

January 13, 2010

The cover of Science features atomically precise inorganic nanostructures, polyoxometalates (POMs), that form by means of atomically precise templates. The outer rings of these structures contain 150 molybdenum atoms.
POMs are a diverse class of nanoscale metal-oxide structures with characteristics that make them remarkably attractive as potential components for self-assembled composite nanosystems.
These characteristics include:

Atomically precise [...]

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The promise that launched

 the field of nanotechnology

December 15, 2009

Part 1 of a series on the history and prospects of advanced nanotechnology concepts, prompted by the upcoming 50th anniversary of Feynman’s historic talk, “There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom”.

When the first million readers encountered “nanotechnology”
Now, over 20 years after the fact, it is easy to forget that a concept called “nanotechnology” first swept [...]

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Flat graphene is stable, even in theory

November 23, 2009

Many scientific papers suggest that the mere existence of free-standing graphene sheets violates theoretical expectations, that it is an anomaly that demands an explanation. A paper in the current Nature describes “Ultraflat graphene”, but this graphene resides safely on mica surfaces. The paper mentions the numerous observations of microscopic corrugations in graphene, and notes that [...]

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Most popular posts, continued…

November 18, 2009

A few weeks ago, I highlighted some of the most popular posts in Metamodern’s first year (see “Knowledge about Knowledge…”). Posts that offer videos, documents, or talk slides also ranked high:
With downloadable documents and talk slides:

Molecular Nanomachines: Physical Principles and Implementation Strategies
My MIT dissertation — a draft of Nanosystems — is now online [...]

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Molecular Electron Holography:
Progress toward atomic-resolution imaging?

October 20, 2009

Hans-Werner Fink’s group reports a remarkable advance in imaging individual biomolecules, with surprising physics, and (to me, at least) a somewhat mysterious date of publication.
The surprise is that it doesn’t destroy the molecules before imaging them.
The new generation of aberration-corrected electron microscopes achieve atomic resolution, but with a caveat — they succeed with robust, inorganic [...]

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Productive Nanosystems: The Ribosome Videos

July 16, 2009

While browsing the literature on the catalysis of bond formation in protein synthesis by ribosomes*, I came across a wonderful set of videos of the ribosomal protein manufacturing system at work, shown in recent-state-of-the-art molecular detail. These videos were presented in a Chemical & Engineering News article online, but I missed seeing them at the [...]

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What is simple?
Polyethylene, molecular modeling,
and molecular machines

July 8, 2009

A scientist recently remarked to me that molecular modeling techniques cannot accurately predict the mechanical properties of typical polymers, even one as simple as polyethylene, a hydrocarbon consisting of long chains of –(CH2)– units. He was, I think, suggesting that molecular modeling may tell us little about molecular technologies based on structures that would be [...]

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Science and Engineering:
A Layer-Cake of Inquiry and Design

June 16, 2009

Inquiry is the essence of science, design is the essence of engineering, and in their pure forms, these activities are utterly different. Scientific inquiry draws observations from the world to reshape the mind; engineering design projects ideas from the mind to reshape the world. One is an eye, the other a hand, afferent and efferent [...]

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