Controlling the assembly of individual molecules has always been an important goal of nanotechnology. In this work, metal ions are held within molecular scaffolds designed for the formation of nanometre-sized, hollow, cubic architectures. Our modular design scheme allows for the use of interchangeable metals and chemical functionalities, which might one day be as diverse as […]
Compressing Hard drives into the Size of a Sugar Cube! Utilizing the Third Dimension of Data Storage For the past few decades, electronics has been a cornerstone of modern technology. However, because of recent initiatives of reducing our carbon footprint, advanced materials and architectures followed by cost-effective manufacturing procedures are currently being investigated for the development […]
Understanding how natural biocatalysts extracted from bacteria can be used for solar driven water splitting and optimising them for utilising hydrogen generation as the future fuel. Sunlight provides us with a practically inexhaustible flow of energy, and the photochemical conversion of solar to chemical energy (e.g. hydrogen) attracts much interest. Direct conversion of solar energy […]
Miniaturisation of barcoding technology brings us one step closer to home diagnostics Rising rates of later age illness including cancer, cardiovascular diseases, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and diabetes have burdened society in the past decades and has rasied critical demands for more efficient, affordable healthcare. Novel medical diagnostic technologies seek to identify disease biomarkers at the earliest […]
Bone-like nanoparticle drug carriers: does aggregation make them dangerous? If you’ve heard much about Nanotechnology then you may also have heard about the huge impact Nanotech can make on medicine in the near future. One area that may be particularly affected is drug delivery: nano-sized “capsules” of drugs could potentially lead to much more efficient, […]
Batteries based on silicon can theoretically hold up to ten times as much charge as the ones currently used in laptops and mobile phones, but scientists have been unable to realise this potential. A new technique allowing researchers to follow the chemical reactions happening inside a battery in real time offers the hope that a […]
Using stiffness measurements as a biological indicator The first thing most people do if they are feeling unwell is to take their temperature. From a raised body temperature alone we cannot deduce what exactly is happening in the body, but it is a definite sign to pay attention and maybe see a doctor. Measuring the […]
How Supramolecular Chemistry can control aggregation The formation of clump-like ordered structures in proteins has been associated with several diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and type II diabetes, and is now thought to be a general feature of protein aggregation. There is considerable interest within the pharmaceutical industry in maintaining the integrity of protein-based drugs […]
Mechanical grinding drives chemical reactions Typically, chemists do reactions by dissolving their starting materials and then heating the solution. An alternative is to use brute force. Grinding solid chemicals together can induce reactions without needing toxic solvents or heat so the environmental cost is far lower than for traditional means. Grinding reactions have been used […]
DNA makes a wonderful material for creating structures at the nanoscale. It can be folded and shaped into three dimensions mimicking the traditional Japanese art of paper origami but at scales one million times smaller. Nano DNA shapes made in this way mimic the intricate 3D structures of biological proteins and have a large range of […]