New Nanotechnology Research Spun Off from “Supramolecular Chemistry”
10 March 2007Science at best can only hope to emulate the greatest achievements of nature’s elegant design, and that is what is happening around the world as researchers in Nanotechnology attempt to borrow from nature by building their own versions of molecular machines. The man who serves as the catalyst for this feverish research activity is Professor Sir Fraser Stoddart of UCLA, a pioneer who blazed a path in supramolecular chemistry, the groundwork for molecular machines. The publication Advanced Functional Materials will publish a special issue honoring the Professor and the Nanotechnology research efforts that have accrued from his work.
Some of the research efforts include projects such as Nanovalves. These devices can be used in the medical field as drug-delivery systems for patients. Other researchers report of doing work in new molecular systems that emulate the contraction of muscle cells in the body. These devices can be adapted to function as valves or switching mechanism components in larger molecular machines. Of course, most machines have rotors of some kind or another. Another group of researchers is using Nanotechnology to build light-powered rotors that can potentially spin at 44 revolutions per second.
Light or electricity is being used in research for other molecular switching mechanisms, using the derivates of the compounds dithienylethene. As light hits the surface, the compounds form rings, but these rings close up as soon as light with lower wavelength patterns hit them, thus being potentially useful as logic gates for a switch. Other researchers are using other molecules and ions to “flip” the switching mechanism. The possibilities using Nanotechnology are endless.
With all of these research efforts and the inspiration of Professor Stoddart’s work in supramolecular chemistry, it will become easy to build the individual pieces of the puzzle that make up molecular machines envisioned by Nanotechnology.
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