Posts tagged as:

fabrication

Atomic Layer Deposition
for Atomically Precise Fabrication (1)

March 23, 2009

I recently posted on a surprising atomically precise fabrication process, and in a comment, Tom Craver remarked that
If a method like this could be combined with Single Layer Deposition , it seems like it’d be getting awfully close to allowing building 3D structures — embedded in a solid, so the next step would be [...]

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AFM Atom Manipulation: A surprising technique

March 14, 2009

Shortly before I launched Metamodern, Science published a remarkable paper by Sugimoto et al. describing atom-by-atom manipulation of a monatomic layer of tin (Sn) on silicon (Si). The animation to the right shows the steps in constructing a pattern of Si atoms that spells ‘Si’. Each frame is an atomic force microscope image made [...]

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High-Throughput Nanomanufacturing:
Assembling larger products (with videos)

March 4, 2009

I’ll get back to self-assembly and related topics soon, but at the moment, I’d like to show more about how macroscale manufacturing works today. There are strong analogies to engineering problems that will arise when a technology base is in place for building complex nanomachines, and I hope that even readers from manufacturing-oriented engineering cultures [...]

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High-Throughput Nanomanufacturing:
Assembly (with videos)

March 1, 2009

If you wanted to use automation to assemble an enormous number of small things, would you use robots? For throughput in the 100 ms/cycle, million-product-per-day range, a room full of robots waving their arms around might not be the best solution. A manufacturing engineer is more likely to think of using a machine like the [...]

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High-Throughput Nanomanufacturing:
Small Parts (with videos)

February 27, 2009

In a post about molecular assembly lines, I discussed non-ribosomal (hence non-programmable) peptide synthetases, a form of specialized molecular manufacturing machinery found in some cells, and added that

In the molecular-manufacturing architecture described in Nanosystems, simple assembly-line mechanisms — not elaborate, programmable machines — perform the overwhelming majority of fabrication operations.

Actually, the term “assembly line” isn’t [...]

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Toward Advanced Nanotechnology:

Nanomaterials (3)

February 8, 2009

Mechanical engineering meets thermal fluctuations
Thermal fluctuations distort nanoscale structures, and this makes them an enemy of nanotechnologies that rely on precise mechanical motion. Indeed, if one were to set aside design and calculation and instead substitute guesses (I’m not naming guilty parties here), one might suppose that this would prevent nanomechanical engineers from designing reliable [...]

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From Self-Assembly to Mechanosynthesis

February 3, 2009

In an ongoing series, I’ve been discussing paths forward from today’s atomically precise fabrication methods to advanced molecular manufacturing. The posts that address broad topics are:
Modular Molecular Composite Nanosystems
Toward Advanced Nanotechnology: Nanomaterials (1)
Toward Advanced Nanotechnology: Nanomaterials (2)
Self-Assembly for Nanotechnology
In some areas I’ve discussed, lab research is active today; in other areas, research (at least, of [...]

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Toward Advanced Nanotechnology:

Nanomaterials (1)

December 27, 2008

The widespread obsession with diamond nanotechnologies is peculiar: How did the idea of molecular manufacturing, a general approach to organizing mechanosynthesis, been become so closely identified with making diamond?

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