Category: Nanodot

An article on the Nanotech Planet website ("Zyvex: Building Nanoscale Machines with Microscopic Engines", by Allen Bernard, 14 February 2002) profiles the steady progress Zyvex is making along a "top-down" pathway toward nanotechnology by attempting to create machines designed to build yet smaller machines that, in turn, build yet smaller machines that manipulate matter at the molecular level in the manner envisioned decades ago by Richard Feynman.

"We'll build the first machine by hand," Zyvex founder and CEO Jim Von Ehr told NanotechPlanet. "And that machine will build other machines … and each of those machines can be ganged together in parallel with other similar machines to build products or another generation of machines."

The strategy is being implemented with the help of a $12.5 million National Institute of Standards and Technology matching grant in October 2001 (see Nanodot post from 25 October 2001). "What we want to end up with after this five-year NIST program is reasonably parallel sub micron scale systems handling sub micron scale parts," Von Ehr said. "I want to be careful about nanoscale. We're not really trying to build with molecules in this program."

Dan Gillmor, technology columnist for the San Jose Mercury News highlights the increasing interest of venture capitalists in nanotechnology ("Big Breakthroughs come in small packages", 16 February 2002): "Small things — really small things — are looking bigger and bigger to the venture capital community these days. Investors smell profits in nanotechnology — building and manipulating things one atom or molecule at a time — and the related field of micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS)." The article also quotes a number of venture capitalists who attended a meeting at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to discuss the possibilities of commercializing nano- and micro-technology. The article was reposted on the Small Times website.

from the World-Watch dept.
An article in the Taipei Times ("Nanotechnology looks promising", by Dan Nystedt, 10 February 2002) underscores Taiwanís efforts to expand its research and development programs in biotechnology and, more recently, the microscopic science of nanotechnology. The article quotes Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian, who said during a tour of a new national Nanotechnology Research Center in January, that nanotechnology was "the new century's rising star" that "will bring about a massive shift in the development of new materials, information-technology products and biomedicine."

But, the article notes, "Others in Taiwan are not so optimistic about how long it will take to develop new products from the nanotechnology initiative. . . . Other critics of Taiwan's proposed nanotechnology program point out that China plans to spend NT$105.7 billion (US$3 billion) by 2005 on nanotechnology research, far more than Taiwan. They believe the government should put more money into R&D so Taiwan can maintain its high-tech advantage over China."

Additional background on Taiwanís nanotechnology initiative can be found in these Nanodot posts from 22 January and 24 January 2002.

According to a press release (14 February 2002), Umar Mohideen, associate professor of physics at the University of California-Riverside, has performed the first demonstration of the lateral Casimir force (a shape-dependent Casimir force) in his laboratory. His findings appeard in Physical Review Letters.

The Casimir force has its origins in virtual particles that exist in empty space. According to the release, the force acts tangential to two surfaces, resulting in a horizontal sliding motion of one surface against the other. This lateral force may make the movement of gears and motors in micromachines easier.