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Catching (Real) Viruses With Silicon
Roland Piquepaille writes "Researchers in Iowa have used nanotechnology to develop a very small silicon chip to catch and help identify viruses, according to Technology Research News. The device, dubbed the ViriChip, is used in conjunction with an atomic force microscope (AFM). The prototype is already able to identify several viruses and should be in labs in less than two years. A particular application could help save lives by enabling doctors to check a donor heart for potential infections before transplanting it to a patient. This overview contains more details. It also includes references to other articles about the ViriChip and images showing how it looks and a virus it detected."
This technique is actually worse than you think.
It can only be used on viruses which have a well known surface behavior, which we have a known antibody for and whose antibody can be attached easily to a SAM (protein monolayer).
On the other hand, this technique requires rinsing away all the viruses which are NOT attached to the antibody. It is very easy (and is done all the time) to just deposit a collection of viruses, or whatever you want, on a piece of silicon and take an AFM of it. Viruses tend to all look similar though.
They're trying to be ultra-specific, for commercial reasons. If you want to do research with this, it's being done now, and has been done for the last 10 years.