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Nano and bio - A suggestion from Michael

Know his book but did not know his blog .... Tough I am sure Luis does :-)

No, actually I only know him from several documentaries. von Neumann probes, those I know quite well from sci-fi :). Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space is a good example btw. Here's a relevant link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-replicating_machine#NIAC_studies_on_self-replicating_systems

Although vacuum tubes were the basic components of early electronic devices, by the 1970s they were almost entirely replaced by semiconductor transistors. They are now back in nano-form as "nanoscale vacuum channel transistors" that combine the best of vacuum tubes and modern semiconductors into a single device. This old-technology with a new twist could be useful for space applications due to broader temperature operational range and better radiation resilience - authors are with NASA Ames.

Physicists in Germany have developed the first-ever "nano-ear" capable of detecting sound on microscopic length scales with an estimated sensitivity that is six orders of magnitude below the threshold of human hearing.

one can see that you are in bed and bored :-)

Electron microscope studies reveal that the electron bombardment leads to polymerization of the outer layer of some insect larva's skin and protects them from dehydration. Artificial method to create this effect tested as well. Allows observation of living animals under electron microscope! Question: can the insects still breath after they are back in air? :-S

Something for our Nano structure fans. Funniest remark: "One of the researchers got to take advantage of his Russian language skills since some of the chemistry details necessary for understanding the reaction mechanism was only available in an old Russian PhD thesis."

Damn... At Leiden University I worked on transmission of light through Ag nano-layers. This could have been an easy experiment. I wonder about the evanescence of the wave as visible light is usually attenuated to <5% within 250nm of silver.

Known technically as a surface plasmon polariton (SPP) wave, the effect will allow the nano-antennas to operate at the low end of the terahertz frequency range, between 0.1 and 10 terahertz - instead of at 150 terahertz With this antenna, we can cut the frequency by two orders of magnitude and cut the power needs by four orders of magnitude," said Jornet. "Using this antenna, we believe the energy-harvesting techniques developed by Dr. Wang would give us enough power to create a communications link between nanomachines." As always, graphene seems to be the answer to anything, but steady progress is being made although one needs to find out first an easy method of generating high quality graphene layers (btw that is also one of the reasons to do the supercapacitor study...)

Well plasmonics is also the solution to everything it seems...

nice paper ... José have a look at it ...

impressive helicopters ... flying slightly better than our gadgets ...

Sounds pretty much Sci-Fi...

very nice project - though I would not call it a "major UK space mission" ..

Scientists from the Nano-Science Center at the Niels Bohr Institut, Denmark and the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland, have shown that a single nanowire can concentrate the sunlight up to 15 times of the normal sun light intensity. The results are surprising and the potential for developing a new type of highly efficient solar cells is great.

Technion researchers have demonstrated, for the first time, that laser emissions can be created through the interaction of light and water waves, in practice mechanical oscillations in fluids at the nanoscale. Interesting concept on the verge of two so far different fields!

Basis for after next generation processors?

Nice formation flying, though I still prefer Dario's 3D animation

very nice indeed!!