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The system that they have developed comprises a 200-micron long and 30-micron wide silicon microcantilever. This support has been nano-structured with around 500,000 vertically aligned titanium dioxide nanotubes. The role of these nanostructures is to multiply the surface area of the microcantilever by a factor of around one hundred and to proportionally increase the chances of capturing the molecules being searched for. By making the microcantilever vibrate, it is possible to determine whether the ambient air contains traces of TNT and if these molecules have been captured by the device.
Image: Enlargement of the forest of TiO2 nanotubes. © Fabien Schnell/NS3E
Denis Spitzer, Dr. Thomas Cottineau, Dr. Nelly Piazzon, Dr. Sébastien Josset, Fabien Schnell, Dr. Sergei Nikolayevich Pronkin, Prof. Elena Romanovna Savinova and Dr. Valérie Keller: Bio-Inspired Nanostructured Sensor for the Detection of Ultralow Concentrations of Explosives, In: Angewandte Chemie International Edition, Volume 51, Issue 22, May 29, 2012, Pages 5334-5338, DOI:10.1002/ anie.201108251:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/anie.201108251
Using the pyroelectric effect, researcher at Gatech, USA, and Beijing Institute of Nanoenergy and Nanosystems, CAS, China, experimentally demonstrate the first application of pyroelectric ZnO nanowire arrays for converting heat energy into electricity. The fabricated nanogenerator has a good stability. © Nano Letters
Ya Yang, Wenxi Guo, Ken C. Pradel, Guang Zhu, Yusheng Zhou, Yan Zhang, Youfan Hu, Long Lin, and Zhong Lin Wang: Pyroelectric Nanogenerators for Harvesting Thermoelectric Energy, In: Nano Letters, Volume 12, Issue 6, June 13, 2012, Pages 2833-2838, DOI: 10.1021/ nl3003039:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/nl3003039
Physicists at The University of Texas at Austin (US), in collaboration with colleagues in Taiwan and China, have developed the world’s smallest semiconductor laser. The device is constructed of a gallium nitride nanorod that is partially filled with indium gallium nitride. Both alloys are semiconduc- tors used commonly in LEDs.
Yu-Jung Lu, Jisun Kim, Hung-Ying Chen, Chihhui Wu, Nima Dabidian, Charlotte E. Sanders, Chun-Yuan Wang, Ming-Yen Lu, Bo-Hong Li, Xianggang Qiu, Wen-Hao Chang, Lih-Juann Chen, Gennady Shvets, Chih-Kang Shih, and Shangjr Gwo: Plasmonic Nanolaser Using Epitaxially Grown Silver Film, In: Science, Vol. 337, Issue 6093, July 27, 2012, Pages 450-453, DOI:10.1126/sci- ence.1223504: