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3D Crystal Grown On a DNA Lattice
An anonymous reader suggests an article over at ScienceDaily about the achievement of the holy grail of nanoscience: "[R]esearchers at the US Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have for the first time used DNA to guide the creation of three-dimensional, ordered, crystalline structures of nanoparticles. The ability to engineer such 3-D structures is essential to producing functional materials that take advantage of the unique properties that may exist at the nanoscale — for example, enhanced magnetism, improved catalytic activity, or new optical properties."
Welcome our body dwelling inner-lords.
Did you light the grail science-beacon on top of the castle? You must be punished!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
...so many cool words in one story... wow ...
'This writing business. Pencils and what-not. Over-rated if you ask me. Silly stuff. Nothing in it' - Eeyore
Oh my god.... Get them off of me!
We're built from information contained in DNA, is it so far a stretch to think that one day we will grow the items we need on a day to day basis? Perhaps this is the basis for replicator technology.
Synthehol anyone?
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When you quote a piece, you're supposed to put anything you add that isn't in the original quote in square brackets. What you add is supposed to be harmless, of course, not changing the original meaning, but keeping it grammatically and typographically correct.
In this case, the full quote would be:
"In an achievement some see as the "holy grail" of nanoscience, researchers..."
The summary dropped the introductory phrase, which makes the quote:
"researchers..."
But if the quote is used where it is, the first letter should be capitalized to make it grammatically correct. Hence, the capital is added, but it's put in square brackets to put you on notice that this is not precisely a direct quote.
Another common use of the convention is when you quote something that contains a pronoun, and you need to put the proper nouns in to make sense of it:
"Joe Slashdot couldn't care less. He hated journalists anyway."
To quote only the second sentence, you'd write:
"[Joe] hated journalists anyway."
Because if you leave it as "he" your audience wouldn't know who the heck "he" is.
a brief explanation of what this is all about:
Intel and AMD spends billions of dollars to print 'tiny' lines. It's actually the *most* expensive and difficult part of the manufacturing process. Scientists now are trying to exploit the tiniest, most precise printing process that nature does routinely. By 'piggy backing' on DNA molecules, scientists/engineers can put materials where they want. Gold is not too interesting since it's just a conductor. But it's a start.
Moreover, with the advances in organic semiconductors, the opportunities seem even more interesting.
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That would make for one hell of a Caesar Salad! Wait, what?
*runs*
DNA structure deduced from crystallography, now crystals formed in DNA lattice. Kind of fun how that worked out.
We figured out a long time ago that it's easier to elect seven judges than to elect 132 legislators.
Does this mean we'll be growing extremely fast processors any time soon?
"The ability to engineer such 3-D structures is essential to producing functional materials that take advantage of the unique properties that may exist at the nanoscale -- for example, enhanced magnetism, improved catalytic activity, or new optical properties."
it sounds cool, but it doesn't sound like they know what to expect. they are guessing
I though the holy grail was self replicating fabricators effectively killing the economy when people can print diamonds, gold, oil, electric cars, monster trucks, food, medical supplies, platinum, titanium, nanotubes, cake, solar panels, computers (to the point that it becomes a computing power vs mass and probably quantum), mp3 players, replacement organs, replacement people, guns, nukes, space elevator materials, self sustaining spaceships/stations, replacement cells to reverse the aging process, green eggs and ham, money, billions of tiny wireless internet routers, man machine interfaces, an actual holy grail (probably many verities, including those from the Indiana Jones movies), mind uploading systems.
A 3D crystal might be cool and could help lead to that but I wouldn't describing it as the 'holy grail' is a bit much
cat
Dude just look at my thesis, it has magnetism, DNA and nanoparticles and to show off I threw in 3D-particles, Im definitely going to pass this year.
Weren't we supposed to invent the warp drive _before_ the replicator?
They claim to have invented a 21st century hammer, they are guessing what it might be used for.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
I've been missing this meme:
1. Cover nanoparticles in DNA.
2. Generate DNA so nanoparticles know how to assemble.
3. Mix and heat.
4. ?????????
5. Profit!!
The real holy grail of nanotech is the molecular assembler. But this is damned cool, and yet another step in that direction. Wake me up when my computer can print me an apple out the carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen it pulls out of the air, and a few other trace elements it already has on hand.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
There are more "holy grails" in nanoscience than you can shake a stick at. Carbon nanotubes that you can build a space elevator out of, making crystals on DNA, molecular assembler, caged medicines deliverable right to the needed site, nanobots that can do anything, self replicating nanostructures....
PICK ONE DAMN "HOLY GRAIL" AND STICK WITH IT. -- Note to all nanoscientists
It reminds me of that scene from last crusade.
I guess it might not be researcher's fault. Lord knows there's plenty of "holy grails" in other fields.
Eventually we're going to see the headline "Anthropologist uncovers the "Holy grail" of Anthropology: a cup Jesus drank out of at the last supper." And then my head is going to explode.
"A 3D crystal might be cool" Yes. Cool like the only way to fabricate any designed, defined and predicted 3D nanostructures on the molecular scale. Cool like to capture proteins and hence be able to crystallize ANY given protein (what is quite difficult). Cool like to produce phonic crystals and cool like to be able to assemble 3D chips with Carbon nanotubes, guided by DNA self assembly. This kind of cool. " and could help lead to that but I wouldn't describing it as the 'holy grail' is a bit much" Sure. You wouldn't. On the other hand you don't have any idea of Nanotech, so who cares?
There are different ways to do this. One would be with a suite like a computer screen that just shows what the observer would expect to see. Problems: Tremendous real time number crunching needed, problems that the object will still have a shadow etc. The elegant solution would be to use a body armor covered with a photonic crystal (Google). This would be one application of the 3D DNA nano crystal. Light would go in the amour, be guided around the body and exit the body, giving the impression that is was not reflected or diffracted -hence an object would be invisbile, at least for a part of the spectrum.