The Singularity University Executive Program recently took on the challenges of advanced nanotech: Nanotechnology: How should we evaluate the environmental impact of human-made machines that are too small to see? What limits should be placed on self-replicating nanodevices? What defenses should we institute against malevolent uses of such technology? These questions were asked by Marc… Continue reading Singularity University takes on advanced nanotech questions
A complex piece of DNA that acts as a biological computer when it is inserted into cells determines whether or not the cell is a specific type of cancer cell, and if so, initiates the suicide of that cell.
Nanotechnology has been applied to produce various types of nanoparticles that can deliver toxic agents specifically to the cancer cells. Many of these approaches have shown promise in animal studies. One approach using magnetic nanoparticles has now gone into trials in patients. From “Nano-therapy that cooks deadly brain tumors advances in Germany,” by Ryan McBride:… Continue reading Magnetic nanoparticles to cook brain cancer go into trial in patient
Christopher William Ince Jr. writes about a new insight into how nanotubes grow, which may lead to even more useful technological applications for these nanostructures: Physicists Zhifeng Ren and Hengzhi Wang of Boston College have discovered two initial stages of carbon nanotube growth previously obscured during the growth process. What the researches found is that… Continue reading Boston College Researches Uncover Early Phases of Carbon Nanotube Growth
An algorithm helps design peptides that will self-assemble on a given surface to produce a supramolecular structure of desired geometry.
Growing heart cells in a scaffold containing gold nanowires produces a tissue patch that is thicker and in which the cells beat synchronously as they do in healthy heart tissue.
Engineered bacteria that incorporate unnatural amino acids at multiple positions provide a new tool that may facilitate designing proteins to fold more predictably into molecular machinery components.
Automated diffraction tomography provides rapid determination of structure of zeolite to atomic precision.
Over at Wired.com: A New York Hall of Science staffer has made a rap video to introduce kids (and probably quite a few adults) to the basics of nanotech. The refrain will help them remember the definition of a nanometer, and the Foresight message comes through: “But with great power comes great responsibility!” The subtitles… Continue reading "Nano Techno" rap song lures kids to learn about nanotech
Ultrasound was used to pull on polymer chains attached to opposite sides of a chemically almost inert molecular ring, splitting it into its two components.
