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Nanotechnology

Nanomaterials

News and Updates

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Avoiding the Crack of Doom

February 25, 2019

Just as a journey of 1,000 miles begins with a single step, the deformations and fractures that cause catastrophic failure in materials begin with a few...

An electron micrograph showing a globular cluster of silver nanoparticles atop the surface of a cutting board from which it was scratched off.

Do Kitchen Items Shed Antimicrobial Nanoparticles After Use?

November 8, 2018

Because of their antimicrobial and antifungal properties, silver nanoparticles measuring between one and 100 nanometers (billionth of a meter) in size, are...

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...

Illustration of a plasmomechanical oscillator

Doing the Nano-Shimmy

April 9, 2018

Imagine a single particle, only one-tenth the diameter of a bacterium, whose miniscule jiggles induce sustained vibrations in an entire mechanical device some...

First Light at NIST’s Spectroscopy Soft and Tender NSLS-II Beamlines

March 14, 2018

February 17, 2018 marked the culmination of ten years of planning and construction for NIST’s NSLS-II Spectroscopy Beamline Suite, with first light at the Soft...

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...

Sub-microscopic LEDs Shed New Light on Advanced Materials

July 12, 2017

One of the persistent challenges in 21 st century metrology is the need to measure ever-more-detailed properties of ever-smaller things, from microchip features...

diagram of perovskite sample examined by the photothermal indued resonance technique

Unexpected Property May Raise Material’s Prospects as Solar Cell

May 22, 2017

Crystalline materials known as perovskites could become the next superstars of solar cells. Over the past few years, researchers have demonstrated that a...

NIST Physicists ‘Squeeze’ Light to Cool Microscopic Drum Below Quantum Limit

January 11, 2017

Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have cooled a mechanical object to a temperature lower than previously thought possible...

Seeing Light’s Effect on Atoms — Within Picoseconds

November 16, 2016

For the first time in a laboratory setting, NIST scientists have made stop-action x-ray measurements of the way visible light interacts with atoms and molecules...

NIST-Made ‘Sun and Rain’ Detail How Nanoparticles Can Escape from Plastic Coatings into the Environment

September 30, 2016

If the 1967 film “The Graduate” were remade today, Mr. McGuire’s famous advice to young Benjamin Braddock would probably be updated to “Plastics … with...

Illustration of prefilling a carbon nanotube with a desired chemical of known properties.

Simpler, Faster and Cheaper: A Full-filling Approach to Making Carbon Nanotubes of Consistent Quality

July 15, 2016

Just as many of us might be resigned to clogged salt shakers or rush-hour traffic, those working to exploit the special properties of carbon nanotubes have...

NIST System Replicated by Chip Maker

June 6, 2016

A highly sensitive measurement system for the performance of nanoscale magnetic devices, invented and developed at NIST, was successfully replicated recently by...

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...

Electron micrograph of surface-directed nanochannels formed on surface of indium phosphide.

Nanoworld "Snow Blowers" Carve Straight Channels in Semiconductor Surfaces

December 28, 2015

In the nanoworld, tiny particles of gold can operate like snow blowers, churning through surface layers of an important class of semiconductors to dig...

Nanoparticle Manufacturing Workshop

November 24, 2015

Following decades of research and development, commercial products enabled by nanoparticles are poised to have broad impact in diverse sectors of the global...

SPS Interns Get the NIST Experience

September 17, 2015

It's not every day that undergraduate students contribute in a meaningful way to research at a national lab in the span of a few weeks. But that's what happened...

CNST Releases the Spring/Summer 2015 Edition of the CNST News

July 28, 2015

The NIST Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology (CNST) Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology (CNST) is pleased to announce the release of the...

carbon nanotubes embedded in a polymer composite

NIST 'How-To' Website Documents Procedures for Nano-EHS Research and Testing

June 30, 2015

As engineered nanomaterials increasingly find their way into commercial products, researchers who study the potential environmental or health impacts of those...

NIST Group Maps Distribution of Carbon Nanotubes in Composite Materials

June 29, 2015

Despite their small size and simple structure, carbon nanotubes—essentially sheets of graphene rolled up into straws—have all sorts of potentially useful...

Tunneling electrons from a scanning tunneling microscope tip excite phonons in a graphene lattice.

Hooked on Phonons: NIST-led Research Group Measures Graphene Vibrations

June 16, 2015

An international research group led by scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology's (NIST) Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology has...

NIST's 'Nano-Raspberries' Could Bear Fruit in Fuel Cells

June 9, 2015

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a fast, simple process for making platinum "nano-raspberries"...

New Imaging Technique Finds Formation of Aluminum Alloys to Blame for Next-Gen Battery Failures

March 3, 2015

Researchers working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the University of Maryland, and Sandia National Laboratories, have for the...

New NIST Reference Material Provides a Silver Lining for NanoEHS Research

March 3, 2015

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has issued a new silver nanoparticle reference material to support researchers studying potential...

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