Sometimes the behavior of electrons in nanostructures can be modelled using classical laws of motion, while at other times more computationally challenging quantum methods are necessary to obtain useful results. Christopher W. Ince of the Nanotechnology Research Foundation writes with news of a new method to distinguish classical from quantum behavior in electrons: Researchers from [...]

The formation of a supramolecular bilayer is induced by buckyball guest molecules.

Singapore and European Union launch project to create and test a molecular-sized processor chip.

A review article presents the amazing features of graphene and discusses how it might complement or replace silicon for the fabrication of electronic devices.

Unique properties of two-dimensional arrays of carbon atoms promise both immediate applications and advantages for the development of advanced nanotechnology.

Nanotechnology Now brings news of a recent Atom Technology workshop in Singapore featuring dual Foresight Institute Feynman Prize winner Christian Joachim, Feynman Prize founder Jim Von Ehr of Zyvex Labs and Zyvex Asia, and Foresight Roadmap participant Damian Allis of Syracuse University: Atom Technology is IMRE’s flagship program led by well known scientist Prof. Christian [...]

Scientists Create World’s First Molecular Transistor. Very nice writeup of the research over at Next Big Future. To my mind what’s new here isn’t the transistor per se — semiconducting and conductive states have been known in CNTs for over a decade, and FET and diode-like arrangements of them have been around for the same. [...]

Technology Review: Complex Integrated Circuits Made of Carbon Nanotubes. The first three-dimensional carbon nanotube circuits, made by researchers at Stanford University, could be an important step in making nanotube computers that could be faster and use less power than today’s silicon chips. Such a computer is still at least 10 years off, but the Stanford [...]

Nanotechnology researchers find reliable, mess-free way to grow graphene. from nanowerk   “You can imagine trying to peel a piece of shrink wrap off a dish to put it on a new dish — it’s going to be messy,” said lead researcher Jiwoong Park, Cornell assistant professor of chemistry and chemical biology. Inspired by previous [...]

Potential leap forward in electron microscopy. from Eurekalert. Why it matters: A non-invasive electron microscope could shed light on fundamental questions about life and matter, allowing researchers to observe molecules inside a living cell without disturbing them. If successful, such microscopes would surmount what Nobel laureate Dennis Gabor concluded in 1956 was the fundamental limitation [...]

An interesting question was posed to my “Do the math” post of last week: What does this have to do with nanotechnology? A little history helps, as usual. Eniac plugboard: Hardware or software?

Some interesting developments in memories: This Nanowerk story reports results out of Alex Zettl’s group at Berkeley on a memory cell that consists of an iron nanoparticle which can be moved back and forth in a nanotube. More information on this can be found at Zettl’s site here. This memory, like someother nanotech schemes, relies [...]

If you connect a 12-volt battery to a 4-ohm lamp, 3 amps of current will flow through the circuit by Ohm’s Law, V=IR. Power = VI = 36 watts will be dissipated by the lamp. If you add a 2-ohm resistor in series with the lamp, the resistances add to 6 ohms, the current is [...]

In Arthur C. Clarke’s classic SF novel Against the Fall of Night, there is a description of the “moving ways”, the powered sidewalks on which people rode around the city, as being made of a material that would have baffled an engineer of our own times because it was solid in one direction and liquid [...]

A major advance in molecular machine fabrication allows the construction of rotaxane molecular shuttles in which organic and inorganic components are mechanically linked in the same molecular structure.

Canadian scientists have discovered how chemical structure can elicit a quantum state that permits the ultrafast movement of energy along an organic polymer.

The synthesis and characterization of molecules called cycloparaphenylenes could provide nanotech with an efficient way of producing armchair carbon nanotubes of pre-determined diameter.

Christian Joachim (who shared the Foresight Nanotech Institute Feynman Prize in the Experimental category in 1997 and won in the Theoretical category in 2005) is heading a group of researchers working to bring about atomic-scale computing. ScienceDaily led us to this European Commission ICT Results feature “Computing in a molecule“, which describes their on-going efforts: [...]

A recent paper from Feynman Prize winner James Tour’s group at Rice relates an interesting new form of memory based on a bistable 2-terminal graphitic switch. Once developed, the switch could form the basis of a high-density non-volatile storage which might replace flash devices (which are already beginning to replace magnetic disks). Rice press release

The recent demonstration of the ability to “fully engineer the electronic band gap of graphene” is a major advance in the top-down approach to nanotech applications that take advantage of the many marvelous properties of graphene.