CORVALLIS, Ore. — Researchers at Oregon State University have reported the successful loading of biological molecules onto “nanosprings” — a type of nanostructure that has gained significant interest in recent years for its ability to maximize s…
Research conducted by scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory has paved the way for development of highly efficient sensors for measuring blood glucose in diabetic patients. Particles the size of a nanometer (that is, one billionth of a meter), which are the building blocks of the science of nanotechnology, have comparable dimensions to animal or plant proteins, thus enabling the integration of these components into hybrid systems exhibiting novel properties.
Scientists have refined a technique that uses very intense light to determine the structure of chemically heterogeneous surfaces with a submillimeter resolution. The description of the technique and its application to the study of varying densities of surface-bound molecules – each about one thousand times smaller than the diameter of a human hair – appears as the cover story of the January 13, 2003, issue of Applied Physics Letters. “Surfaces with gradually varying structures are being investigated by academia and industry for their potential uses in creating cleaner energy sources, designing chemical and biological sensors, and creating molecular patterns,” said Jan Genzer, a chemical engineer at North Carolina State University in Raleigh and the lead author of the study. “By determining the chemical structure of surfaces covered with films as thin as a few billionths of a meter, scientists and engineers can improve their properties and performance.”