Nanoscale 3D Printer Now Commercially Available

kkleiner writes "Now the field of 3D printing has advanced so far that a company called Nanoscribe is offering one of the first commercially available 3D printers for the nanoscale. Nanoscribe's machine can produce tiny 3D printed objects that are only the width of a single human hair. Amazingly this includes 3D printed objects such as spaceships, micro needles, or even the empire state building."

Comments

Amazing technology but micro, not nano.

[John Hasler]

n/t

Re:Amazing technology but micro, not nano.

[John Hasler]

> so 30nm resolution is not nano scale enough for you?

That's 3% at one micron: barely adequate for devices with minimum dimensions of one micron and up. For nanoscale devices you need one nanometer or better.

Look at the examples. They're all dimensioned in the tens to hundreds of microns.

Re:Amazing technology but micro, not nano.

[hairyfish]

"Nano" actually now means "small" to the press. I'm sorry it isn't technically correct, but you are going to have to get used to it.

No we're not. I can accept this interpretation in the local rag, but Slashdot's target audience is smart people (apparently). We should be sticking to technically accurate terminology at all times.

Re:Amazing technology but micro, not nano.

[dissy]

It's a bit of a long read, but (IMHO) one of the best sources on the matter is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.

He describes the very concept of nanotechnology, defines it as well as much philosophy around it, with plenty of examples of thing that can be done once manufacturing on this scale is achieved.

Such machines do technically already exist, such as the ribosome. Once a similar machine is created that is under complete human control pragmatically, it will be a world altering event.

If you think of the process of a cell performing its work, dividing, assembling its programmed structure, and eventually creating something on the macro scale like a whale or elephant - then you are thinking on the right scale.

The 3D printer referenced in the article is not yet able to produce structures at this scale, let alone functional machines at this scale.
At best it might be one step on the path towards true nanotechnology, as smaller tools build smaller tools and so on.

Some additional material on the subject that found recently was on youtube under productive nanosystems
While this is purely an artists rendering, one video I happened upon that really brings home the scale factor is their nano-factory video.

This is what most people are referring to when using the term nanotechnology.

A nanoscale printer sound really awesome

[OhANameWhatName]

But I'm certain I'd lose it.

This could be a boon to semiconductors and MEMS

[asm2750]

Right now it can take weeks to make complete microchip with the current fabrication methods. The fabrication size of this printer isn't that great however since most of what is seen in the TFA looks to be around 100 nanometers compared to the 28 nanometers a modern fab can make. However, it would be great to have for rapid prototypes of processors or be used to make devices that fabricate well at large sizes like flash memory.

This printer would work extremely well for MEMS devices since the complex structures such sensors can now just be printed rather than deposited and etched over and over again in a microchip fab.

Re:Just what I wanted

[TheLink]

It's nothing to sneeze at.

Re:Getting Closer

[Anonymous Coward]

But there's no trial and error with 3D printing.... Sigh.... No no, it's just like Star Trek, right?

Re:Okay, that's great. Now scale it.

[Opportunist]

You're barking up the wrong tree. Getting to this precision isn't the problem with "normal scale" prototyping. That could be accomplished long before the advent of 3D printing, and high precision prototypes are not really the area where 3D printers are used. At least not the consumer grade models that most people know about.

3D printing was and is about is to make the whole deal cheap. To give everyone access to the ability to produce plastic prototypes that doesn't involve a process that resembles playing with very expensive Play-Doh.

This thing is a completely different beast altogether. From the looks of it alone you can easily tell that "cheap" wasn't really one of the corner stones this project rested on. Building really tiny things was.