Nanotech Glossary of Terms
- Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM)
- Similar to STM, AFM is based on scanning
a flexible, force-sensing cantilever across a specimen. Attractive
and repulsive forces acting on the tiny diving-board-like arm cause
deflections that can be measured with laser methods. The newer proximal
probe can be used in a number of modes of operation. Included are
a contact mode, in which the tip touches the specimen surface and
senses internuclear repulsive forces between nuclei in the tip and
sample, and a non-contact mode that exploits electrostatic or van
der Waals forces. As with STM, a feedback circuit can be used to adjust
the tip-to-sample distance to maintain constant force. The tip motions
can be recorded and converted into relief maps.
- ATPase
(AKA The F0F1 Complex, ATP synthase)
- A protein complex responsible for converting electrical potential
energy (from a nanoscale battery) into ATP, the molecule used for
immediate fuel by virtually all living systems. It is considered to
be a molecular motor.
- Biological Processing Unit (BPU)
- A BPU is the biological equivalent of a computers CPU. Using DNA strands as input and output, two of the DNA amino acids as computer bits, and two enzymes (for cut and paste respectively). The early 2-state/2-symbol BPU published in November 2001 had approximately 10^9 units, collectively they took up 1 ml in volume and could perform at 1GHz. Not bad when you consider that Electronic CPU's took nearly 80 years of technical advances to get to the same speeds.
- BuckminsterFullerene
(AKA Bucky Balls, Bucky Tubes, Fullerene Tubes, Nanotubes)
- Buckminsterfullerenes were discovered in September 1985 by Harry
Kroto and David Walton. They consist of spherical or tubular molecules
of carbon atoms. They are seen by many as important for structural
components in MNT systems due to their unique physical properties,
the least of which being strength and stability on the nanometer scale.
More details are available at New
Scientist Planet Science.
- Diamondoid
- Meaning "similar to diamond. Diamondoid has a similar carbon lattice
which has been doped with atoms in such a way as to shape or to alter
the lattice for some useful purpose. Diamandoid is (like diamond)
an exceptional thermal conductor, hard and relatively rigid, not particularly
dense (only about 10 times that of air), and has many connection points
on its doped carbon lattice for any external constructs.
- Drexlerian Nanotechnology
- The specific area of Molecular Nanotechnology where the machines
are designed to be self-reproducing in addition to their main task
of molecular level construction of some other construct.
- Giga-ops Computers
- Giga-ops is an abbreviation of Giga-operation, in more common language
a Giga-op Computer would be known as a PC with a GHz CPU chip inside
it instead of a MHz chip. These type of computers are available now,
but as desktop PCs which are enormous by nanotech scales. The type
of Giga-ops computers nanotech people refer to are likely to be smaller
than a wristwatch. see BPU above for an example.
- Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS)
- MEMS is at the present time the closest we have come to fully working
nano devices. They are as yet still in the micrometer scale but a
large amount of research is going into size reduction down into the
nanometer scale in a top down approach. More details on this field
are available at the MEMS clearinghouse.
- Molecular Nanotechnology (MNT)
- Technology designed to operate at the molecular level (nanoscale),
capable of manipulating matter molecule by molecule.
- Nanites
- Introduced in the 1989 "Star Trek: The Next Generation" episode
"Evolution," in which whiz kid Wesley Crusher modifies standard
24th-century medical nanobots ("small enough to enter living
cells") to learn and alter each other. They escape his petri dish,
replicate with the speed of bacteria, and take over the
"Enterprise-D's" main computer.
- NanoDiamond
- The term "nano diamond" can mean several things. Nanometer-sized diamond
particles (for example detonation nanodiamond),
diamond like material made via assemblers (also called diamondoid,
sometimes other atoms are used to dope the structure, such as nitrogen and
boron and even silicon), and vapor-deposited molecular-precise diamond.
More Info available at www.buckymesh.com
{EC}
- Nanolithography
- A collection of techniques used by microchip makers to etch the
submicron scale pathways of recent (late 1990s)generations of computer
chips. These techniques are more precise than earlier ones, but are
merely evolutionary in nature; while they may carve features only
a few hundred silicon atoms wide, the result is still ragged and statistical,
unlike true bottom-up molecular manufacturing.
- Nanoparticles
- Clusters of a few hundred or thousand atoms that display very
different properties (often useful) from bulk aggregates of
trillions. They are created with standard aerosol or solution chemistry
techniques -- i.e. with no precise control of atom count or
placement.
- Nanoprobes
- This term has seen frequent use in "Star Trek: Voyager" to describe
an injection of Borg nanobots used to "assimilate" individuals of
other species, altering them at the cellular and genetic level. In
the 1997 episode "Mortal Coil" they were used to resuscitate a character
who had been conventionally dead for 18 hours, by "reversing cellular
necrosis" -- putting on screen a capability cautiously described by
Drexler
in his 1986 "Engines
of Creation" as "cell repair machines." {PET}
- Ribosome
- Ribosome's manufacture all the proteins used in all living things
on this planet. Based inside a cell a typical ribosome is relatively
small (a few thousand cubic nanometers) and is capable of building
almost any protein by stringing together amino acids (the building
blocks of proteins) in a precise linear sequence as instructed by
tRNA in the cell.
- Scanning Tunneling Microscope (STM)
- The Scanning Tunneling Microscope was developed by a team of Researchers
at IBM. The STM generates surface contour maps in which atomic-scale
features can be resolved by carefully scanning an ultra sharp metal
tip across a specimen surface while measuring electrical currents.
When its metal probe tip is brought to within approximately 1 nm of
a conducting surface and a small voltage is applied to the tip, an
electric current can be caused to flow between tip and sample. (The
direction of flow depends on applied voltage.) The term "tunneling"
is used because of the quantum mechanical effect of the same name
that explains how it's possible for electrons with very little energy
to pass through the gap between the two surfaces. The electrons make
the trip by tunneling through the huge potential barrier. By monitoring
the tunneling current with a feedback circuit while the sample is
being scanned, the researcher can continuously adjust the probe to
maintain a fixed height above the surface. The subtle up-and-down
and lateral scanning motions of the tip are controlled by piezoelectric
elements and recorded by a computer. The three-dimensional information
can be displayed as an elevation map.