Tumbler Archive

Three to do with Nanotechnology! Yahoo! (I’ll just paste those ones here to make sure you see them; you’re welcome!)

4. DNA Orgami

Scientists at Caltech have been folding microscopic strands of DNA into interesting shapes for the past few years. A cool party trick for sure, until a breakthrough last summer suggested that the folded strands could be used to create ultrasmall computer chips. That’s when the scientists teamed up with IBM researchers and showed that they could strategically position folded DNA shapes, such as triangles, along the sort of silicon wafer used in microchips. This should allow them to use pieces of the DNA strands as anchor points for tiny computer-chip components that could be built as little as 6 nanometers apart—a huge improvement over the current stand-ard of 45 nm.

9. Nanoyarn

Carbon nanotubes have been touted as the next big thing ever since their discovery in 1991. The appeal lies in their strength (they are up to 100 times stronger than steel) and their ability to conduct both heat and electricity. But, until now, they’ve been too difficult to manufacture in useful quantities. That’s finally changing: New Hampshire-based Nanocomp Technologies is weaving nanotubes into lengths of yarn that can be built into commercial applications. The company recently delivered more than 6 miles of nanoyarn to a major aerospace client, and successful bullet-stopping tests last spring have the Pentagon excited about the prospect of next-gen body armor that’s both lighter and thinner than Kevlar.

10. Ultracapacitors

The biggest challenge for electric cars is energy storage: Batteries are better than ever, but they are still expensive, slow to charge and have fairly limited life spans. The solution may be ultracapacitors, which hold less energy than batteries (at least as the technology currently stands) but have virtually none of their drawbacks. That means longer life spans, no messy chemical reactions, no issues with battery memory and far greater durability. Researchers have been trying to perfect automotive ultracapacitors for several years (MIT is working on nanotube-based ultracaps, while Argonne National Laboratory is exploring battery-ultracap hybrids), but the big move could come from the secretive Texas-based company EEStor, which announced in April that its barium-titanate design had passed a crucial test. Though the company’s claims have aroused skepticism, EEStor’s automotive partner, ZENN Motors, is hyping the release of an ultracapacitor-powered car in 2010.