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Physical Measurement Laboratory

Microsystems and Nanotechnology Division

News and Updates

Keyword

Topic Area

NIST Study Resolves Fine Details of How Microscopic Machines Can Fail in the Blink of an Eye

November 27, 2018

How long can tiny gears and other microscopic moving parts last before they wear out? What are the warning signs that these components are about to fail, which

An electron micrograph showing many blue-colored nanoscale (billionth of a meter) particles of varying sizes and shapes scattered atop a silicon wafer.

Connecting the (Nano) Dots: NIST Says Big-Picture Thinking Can Advance Nanoparticle Manufacturing

August 22, 2018

Nanoparticle manufacturing, the production of material units less than 100 nanometers in size (100,000 times smaller than a marble), is proving the adage that

Through a Prism Brightly: A New Way to Measure the Light-Warping Properties of Hyperbolic Metamaterials

June 18, 2018

Manipulating light in a variety of ways—shrinking its wavelength and allowing it to travel freely in one direction while stopping it cold in another--hyperbolic

A New Way to Measure Energy in Microscopic Machines

June 8, 2018

What drives cells to live and engines to move? It all comes down to a quantity that scientists call “free energy,” essentially the energy that can be extracted

NIST Puts the Optical Microscope Under the Microscope to Achieve Atomic Accuracy

May 22, 2018

Over the last two decades, scientists have discovered that the optical microscope can be used to detect, track and image objects much smaller than their

Illustration of sunlight shining on solar panel covered with nanometer-scale beads.

Psst! A Whispering Gallery for Light Boosts Solar Cells

April 13, 2018

Trapping light with an optical version of a whispering gallery, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a

A Stopwatch for Nanofluids: NIST Files Provisional Patent Application for Measuring Nanoliter Flow Rates

January 17, 2018

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has filed a provisional patent application for a microflow measurement system, about the size of a

sphere-shaped particles of different sizes on a nanometer-scale staircase with 7 steps

Atomic Blasting Creates New Devices to Measure Nanoparticles

December 14, 2017

Like sandblasting at the nanometer scale, focused beams of ions ablate hard materials to form intricate three-dimensional patterns. The beams can create tiny

Illustration showing lines of electrical force around an opening to a cell.

Scientists Channel Graphene to Understand Filtration and Ion Transport into Cells

December 8, 2017

Tiny pores at a cell’s entryway act as miniature bouncers, letting in some electrically charged atoms—ions—but blocking others. Operating as exquisitely

NIST Scientists Discover How to Switch Liver Cancer Cell Growth from 2-D to 3-D Structures

November 15, 2017

Paving the way for testing experimental drugs in more realistic environments, scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have

Image showing several lines of a circuit, with an inset showing a device that has both a quantum dot and a network of waveguides

Hybrid Circuit Combines Single-Photon Generator and Efficient Waveguides on One Chip

November 7, 2017

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and their collaborators have taken a new step forward in the quest to build quantum

Cavity coating in flat red layer below blue-green light beam

Plasmons in an Open Box Create Miniature Laser

October 12, 2017

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed the first miniature laser in which the light is guided along the floor of

Researchers Find New Way to Manipulate Magnetism

September 14, 2017

In a pioneering effort to control, measure and understand magnetism at the atomic level, researchers working at the National Institute of Standards and

Even Better than DNA Origami

September 1, 2017

DNA is the stuff of life, but it is also the stuff of nanotechnology. Because molecules of DNA with complementary chemical structures recognize and bind to one

scanning electron micrograph of a single phononic-crystal cell

New Design Lets Micro-Clock Resonators Ring Like a Bell

August 30, 2017

You can’t hear most of them, but the world is running on different kinds of mechanical oscillations. For example, inside the average electronic wristwatch is a

Quantum Thermometer or Optical Refrigerator?

June 22, 2017

In an arranged marriage of optics and mechanics, physicists have created microscopic structural beams that have a variety of powerful uses when light strikes

Turning Back Time: Watching Rust Transform into Iron

April 4, 2017

Using a state-of-the-art microscopy technique, experimenters at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and their colleagues have witnessed a

Measuring Acceleration with Light

March 29, 2017

Most people have never seen an accelerometer -- a device that measures change in velocity -- and wouldn’t know where to look. Yet accelerometers have become

How To Tell When a Nanoparticle is Out of Shape

December 20, 2016

Nanoparticles -- those with diameters less than one-thousandth the width of a human hair -- are increasingly prevalent in high technology, medicine, and

schematic of laser light interacting with a plasmonic gap resonator

NIST Device for Detecting Subatomic-Scale Motion Has Potential Robotics, Homeland Security Applications

December 15, 2016

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a new device that measures the motion of super-tiny particles traversing

For Wearable Electronic Devices, NIST Shows Plastic Holes Are Golden

November 23, 2016

In science, sometimes the best discoveries come when you’re exploring something else entirely. That’s the case with recent findings from the National Institute

Drawing of a spiral delay line heater element, designed with the CNST Nanolithography Toolbox software

New Nanoscale Design Software Available Online

October 21, 2016

A recently developed CNST software package that designs difficult-to-draw nanoscale shapes, including spirals, S-bends, and tapered structures is now available

NIST Illuminates Transfer of Nanoscale Motion Through Microscale Machine

September 12, 2016

From the printing press to the jet engine, mechanical machines with moving parts have been a mainstay of technology for centuries. As U.S. industry develops

CNST's Nano-fare Draws a Crowd at the Maker Faire

June 21, 2016

At last weekend's National Maker Faire in Washington, D.C., tech-savvy tinkerers, crafters and educators gave the public the chance to interact with a

False-color scanning electron micrograph of a nanophotonic frequency converter

New Nanodevice Shifts Light's Color at Single-Photon Level

April 18, 2016

Converting a single photon from one color, or frequency, to another is an essential tool in quantum communication, which harnesses the subtle correlations

Advanced communications
-Open Radio Access Network (Open-RAN)
-Quantum communications
-Spectrum sharing
-Wireless (RF)
Bioscience
-Bioeconomy
--Biological data
-Bioimaging
-Bioinformatics
-Biomanufacturing
-Biomaterials
-Biometrology
-Biosecurity
--Biosurveillance
--Genomic cybersecurity
--Nucleic acid sequence screening
-Cell measurements
-Engineering / synthetic biology
--Biofabrication
--Cell-free systems
--Genome engineering
--Protein engineering
-Gene delivery systems
-Genome editing
-Genomics
-Glycomics
-Metabolomics
-Microbial measurements
-Proteomics
-Transcriptomics
Buildings and Construction
-Building codes and standards
-Building control systems
-Building damage and repair
-Building economics
-Building materials
-Energy efficiency
-Heating, ventilation and air conditioning equipment
-Indoor air quality
-Structural engineering
-Thermal comfort
Chemistry
-Analytical chemistry
-Chemical engineering and processing
-Chemical thermodynamics and chemical properties
-Molecular characterization
-Theoretical chemistry and modeling
-Thermochemical properties
Electronics
-Electromagnetics
-Flexible electronics
-Magnetoelectronics
-Optoelectronics
-Organic electronics
-Semiconductors
-Sensors
-Superconducting electronics
Energy
-Alternative energy
-Conventional energy
-Electric power / smart grid
-Fuels
Environment
-Air / water / soil quality
-Climate Measurements
-Environmental health
-Greenhouse gas measurements
-Marine science
-Sustainability
Fire
-Fire detection
-Fire dynamics and science
-Fire fighting
-Fire modeling
-Fire risk reduction
-Materials flammability
-Structural fire resistance
-Wildland urban interface fire
Forensic Science
-Digital evidence
-Drugs and toxicology
-Firearms and toolmarks
-Forensic biometrics
-Forensic genetics
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Health
-Biopharmaceuticals
-Cell and gene therapy
-Clinical diagnostics
--Cancer
--Medical imaging
-Food and nutrition
-Human microbiome
-Precision medicine
-Regenerative medicine and advanced therapy
--Flow cytometry
Information technology
-Artificial intelligence
--AI measurement and evaluation
--Applied AI
--Fundamental AI
--Hardware for AI
--Machine learning
--Trustworthy and responsible AI
-Biometrics
-Cloud computing and virtualization
-Complex systems
-Computational science
-Conformance testing
-Cyber-physical systems
--Smart cities
-Cybersecurity
--Cryptography
--Cybersecurity education and workforce development
--Cybersecurity measurement
--Identity and access management
--Privacy engineering
--Risk management
--Securing emerging technologies
--Trustworthy networks
--Trustworthy platforms
-Data and informatics
--Human language technology
--Information retrieval
--Natural language processing
-Federal information processing standards (FIPS)
-Health IT
-Internet of Things (IoT)
-Interoperability testing
-Location based services
-Mobile
-Networking
--Mobile and wireless networking
--Network management and monitoring
--Network modeling and analysis
--Network security and robustness
--Network test and measurement
--Next generation networks
--Protocol design and standardization
--Software defined and virtual networks
-Privacy
-Software research
--Software testing
-Usability and human factors
--Accessibility
-Video analytics
-Virtual / augmented reality
-Visualization research
-Voting systems
Infrastructure
Manufacturing
-Additive manufacturing
-Factory communications
-Factory operations planning and control
-Interoperability in manufacturing
-Machining
-Manufacturing economics
-Manufacturing quality assurance
-Manufacturing systems design and analysis
-Monitoring, diagnostics and prognostics
-Process improvement
-Process measurement and control
-Product data
-Robotics in manufacturing
--Agility and adaptability
--Collaborative robots
--Dexterous grasping
--Manipulation
--Mobility and industrial autonomous vehicles
--Navigation / actuation / control
--Sensing and perception
-Supply chain
-Sustainable manufacturing
-Systems engineering
-Systems integration
-Technology commercialization
Materials
-Ceramics
-Composites
-Concrete / cement
-Materials characterization
--Composition and structure
--Mechanical properties
--Thermal properties
-Metals
-Modeling and computational material science
-Polymers
-Superconductors
Mathematics and statistics
-Experiment design
-Image and signal processing
-Modeling and simulation research
-Numerical methods and software
-Statistical analysis
-Uncertainty quantification
Metrology
-Amount of substance
-Dimensional metrology
-Electrical / electromagnetic metrology
-Flow metrology and rheology
-Force metrology
-Humidity metrology
-Ionizing radiation metrology
-Mass metrology
-Metric
-Optical / photometry / laser metrology
-Pressure and vacuum metrology
-Thermometry metrology
-Time and frequency metrology
-Weights and measures
Nanotechnology
-Nanobiotechnology
-Nanochemistry
-Nanoelectronics
-Nanofabrication / manufacturing
--Lithography
--Self-assembly
-Nanofluidics
-Nanomagnetics
-Nanomaterials
-Nanomechanics
-Nanometrology
-Nanophotonics
-Nanophysics
-Nanoplasmonics
Neutron research
Performance excellence
-Assessment tools and services
-Baldrige award
-Baldrige examiners
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-Best practices
-Leadership development
Physics
-Atomic / molecular / quantum
-Biological physics
-Condensed matter
-Electron physics
-Magnetics
-Nuclear physics
-Optical physics and communications
-Quantum information science
-Radiation
-Spectroscopy
-Thermodynamics
-Time and frequency
Public safety
-Chemical / Biological / Radiological / Nuclear / Explosives (CBRNE)
-First responder preparedness
-Law enforcement
-Public safety communications research
-Response robots
Resilience
-Community resilience
--Recovery
--Resilience metrics
-Disaster and failure studies
-Earthquake risk reduction
-Resilience economics
-Resilient materials
-Windstorm impact reduction
Standards
-Accreditation
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-Documentary standards
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-Reference data
-Reference instruments
-Reference materials
-Standards education
Technology transfer
Transportation
-Aerospace
-Automotive