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Take X, break it down into atoms, and build Y from them

At least 51,000 websites deal with "nanotechnology" -
A "wounding" technology, whose entire future is still ahead of it and probably has a great future. What's all the fuss about?

Aharon Hauptman

(A modified version of this article was published in Haaretz newspaper, March 20, 2000)

Direct link to this page: https://www.hayadan.org.il/haupman200300.html

Nanotechnology is based on a rudimentary but impressive ability to manipulate individual molecules and atoms: to move them from place to place and arrange them in different configurations. The prefix "nano" comes from "nanometer" - a thousandth of a micron (a micron is a thousandth of a millimeter) - as the size of certain molecules. The smallest electronic circuits in today's microelectronics are about 250 nanometers in size - a huge size compared to the field of nanotechnology. But size is not the only factor. It is about a total change of perception: building things from atoms and molecules, the building blocks of nature, as if they were "Lego" blocks. Atoms as Lego blocks? And is it possible to hold an atom in the hand? It is also possible - although not exactly by hand.

The "smallest calculator in the world": built with the help of STM from "fullerene" molecules - ball-shaped molecules made of 60 carbon atoms, which are considered a possible building block for future nano products. Source: IBM

The basic idea is not even new. Back in 1959, the renowned physicist Richard Feynman gave a lecture at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in which he explained that there is no physical law that precludes the possibility of "playing" with individual atoms and arranging them as we wish, one by one. "This is an inevitable development," he claimed, and also predicted that a day would come when, if he needed surgery, he would not abandon himself to the hands of a surgeon but simply swallow him - a hint to the future "nano-robot" cruising in the bloodstream, repairing cells , opens blockages in blood vessels and strengthens our body. Today, experts believe that such a "nano-surgeon" is expected by the year 2010. About a quarter of a century after Feynman's lecture, the device that paved the way for the realization of the dream was invented: the STM - "scanning tunneling microscope". The inventors (Binnig and Rohrer from IBM) intended ''in general'' to study materials at atomic resolution: to see (or rather feel) separate atoms. The heart of the device is a very sharp needle that scans the surface of a material, with the tip almost touching the material. Electrons jump from the tip of the needle to the nearest atom below (this is "tunneling" - one of the oddities of quantum physics). The electron flow is measured and "translated" into computer imaging - where the atoms appear as clear bumps. Surprisingly, it turned out that while controlling the "tunneling current" it is possible to "catch" a desired atom, move it from its place, and place it somewhere else. This was already a real revolution: for the first time man had at his disposal a tool for holding individual atoms and arranging them in a desired structure. On the website "STM Gallery" of IBM laboratories you can admire a collection of "works of art" - beautiful arrangements of atoms made in STM.


"Quantity Coral" - from the collection of works of the "STM Gallery": 48 iron atoms arranged on a copper surface. Source: IBM

From here the road is short for the imagination to run amok regarding the future possibilities of "nano-engineering". Eric Drexler, the "prophet" of molecular nanotechnology, wrote an entire engineering book on "nanosystems": bearings, gears, robotic arms - all made of individual atoms. Part of the scientific community reacted with complete skepticism. Others enthusiastically embraced the vision of the "molecular creature": after all, everything in the world is made of molecules and atoms, so why not develop in the future "Universal Assemblers", a kind of tiny robots that can break everything down into atoms, and build everything else from them Will we want it? Imagine when in the future we will be able to "download" from the Internet software with the molecular structure of some product, including assembly instructions, connect it to a homemade device (with a little trash as raw material), press a button - and quickly sense the desired product (perhaps a juicy steak? ) Ready to use. That wonderful device will also be able to replicate itself, of course - according to Drexler's vision of nanotechnology. An end to polluting factories, an end to scarcity and hunger - and welcome to the age of ultimate abundance!

The realization of this vision is still very far away and some say - even impossible. Don Eigler, the scientist from IBM who discovered the manipulation ability of the STM, says that at the moment it is not even possible to think about practical industrial use, but "only" pure research. The process is too slow, complicated, formations cannot be built from every molecule, and if possible - still only flat, two-dimensional formations. Still, in the near term, the first applications of nanoscience are expected. For example - nanoelectronics, which will replace microelectronics. The result: molecular electronic circuits, and hence faster and more efficient computers, which put in the shade the peak of today's refinements. Serious research centers invest a lot of resources in future nanotechnology. At NASA, for example, they deal with computer simulations of engines and molecular machines - which they still don't know how to actually build, but the computer proves their feasibility.


Computer simulation of a gear relay made of atoms. Source: NASA

At the beginning of 2000, President Clinton announced a "National Nanotechnology Initiative" - ​​in a speech he delivered, of course, in the same hall at Caltech where Feynman's prophetic lecture was given in 1959. The Interdisciplinary Forum of Tel Aviv University is holding, at the initiative of the Center for Technological Forecasting, a meeting with the industry people about the "world of the nano". Among other things, Prof. Eshel Ben Yaakov from the Faculty of Exact Sciences described how bacteria can be destroyed with the help of "nanoparticles" instead of antibiotics. Prof. Amichai Freeman (from the Department of Molecular Biology) reviewed the fascinating developments in the biological track - perhaps the most promising track of nanotechnology: the use of biological molecules such as DNA, as the "Lego blocks" of nano-biomechanics and nano-bio- Future electronics.

In the last year, with huge investments, interdisciplinary research centers for nanotechnology are being established in the best universities in Israel: Tel Aviv University, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, the Hebrew University and the Technion. At the end of May 2000, the University of Tel Aviv held an international conference on nanoscience, in which Prof. Seeman from New York University (the first to build a tiny mechanical device from DNA molecules) and Dr. Jim Gimzewski from the IBM Laboratory in Zurich participated, among others. responsible for most of the "molecular creations" through the STM). The "nano" era is upon us.

A cube made of DNA - perhaps a building block for future nano products. Source: New York University, Prof. Seaman's laboratory

Nano technology portal on the science site
A compilation of Dr. Aharon Hauptman's articles on the Hidan website
https://www.hayadan.org.il/BuildaGate4/general2/data_card.php?Cat=~~~142577783~~~222&SiteName=hayadan

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