Molecular quantum nanosensors can precisely measure the temperature inside of individual living cells

Amazing stuff! This could be breakthrough!

"A ‘thermometer’ made of quantum nanosensors can detect the temperature in individual cells. With it, researchers have found that temperature varies by as much as 1 ºC in different parts of a cancer cell.

The sensors could also detect signs of oxidative stress and the production of free radicals, reactive molecules that can damage DNA.

The crystal fragments that made up the tool didn’t seem to damage cancer cells when injected or absorbed, but the researchers want to make them even smaller so they can “spy on cellular activities” ... “It’s a fantastic milestone,” s... “It will be so useful for disease detection.”"

"... The MoQN is a technique utilizing a special kind of quantum crystal which is injected into a tissue to be monitored. The crystal reads the surrounding temperature, and this signal is read by an optical magnetic process called optically detected magnetic resonance (ODMR). Conceptually, it has some things in common with the way MRI machines work ... 

The MoQN is nontoxic and can read temperatures within living cells. Also, by applying a quantum property known as molecular spin, MoQNs are fabricated with incredible precision, yielding great homogeneity leading to very high accuracy. ..."

From the abstract:

"Quantitatively mapping temperature within living cells is essential for understanding subcellular biophysical processes; however, existing intracellular quantum sensors such as nanodiamonds with nitrogen-vacancy centers, quantum dots, and fluorescent proteins face limitations in material heterogeneity, cytotoxicity, and thermometric specificity.

Here, we present molecular quantum nanosensors (MoQNs) as a next-generation platform for intracellular quantum sensing. MoQNs embed pentacene molecular spin qubits within para-terphenyl nanocrystals coated with Pluronic F-127, yielding a coherent spin system with molecular-level uniformity and long spin coherence times under physiological conditions.

By chemically suppressing hyperfine interactions, we enhance spectral resolution and demonstrate spatially resolved absolute temperature sensing inside the cytoplasm and nuclei of cancer cells.

MoQNs thus offer a chemically tunable, biologically compatible platform for quantum-level detection of thermal and biochemical states of intracellular environments."

Nature Briefing: Cancer

Quantum ‘thermometer’ takes temperatures inside living cancer cells "Nanosensors showed that different parts of the cell varied by as much as 1 ºC." (no public access)

Tiny molecular quantum thermometer can measure the insides of cells (original news release) "A new way to record temperatures at microscopic scales with incredibly high precision"

Molecular quantum nanosensors functioning in living cells (open access)

Intracellular quantum sensing. A diagram showing how MoQN can report the temperature from within cells. In this example, a cancer cell containing MoQN can be measured by an external ODMR when a small microwave signal is applied to activate the MoQN.

Fig. 1. Schematics of in-cell ODMR using MoQNs and CW-ODMR and pulsed-ODMR characterization.

Fig. 4. Absolute temperature measurement inside the nuclei of cancer cells.

For First Time, DNA Tech Offers Both Data Storage and Computing Functions

The research on DNA based computers continues!

"... DNA is rather fragile to work with, it can be hard to reliably write to, read from, move and process information on it. But the new study claims to have developed a new system that can solve those problems. The key is a soft polymer material that acts like a scaffold for the DNA, which can be dehydrated for long term storage and rehydrated for retrieval. ...
To write data to the DNA, algorithms first convert it into sequences of nucleic acids – the familiar ACGT letters of DNA code. Specific pieces of information can be retrieved using RNA molecules that copy the data from the DNA, and then sequencing that RNA. That means you don’t have to destroy the DNA to read back from it, unlike some existing DNA data techniques. ..."

"Researchers f... have demonstrated a technology capable of a suite of data storage and computing functions – repeatedly storing, retrieving, computing, erasing or rewriting data – that uses DNA rather than conventional electronics. Previous DNA data storage and computing technologies could complete some but not all of these tasks. ..."

From the abstract:

"... Here we present a DNA-based store and compute engine that captures these primordial capabilities. This system comprises multiple image files encoded into DNA and adsorbed onto ~50-μm-diameter, highly porous, hierarchically branched, colloidal substrate particles comprised of naturally abundant cellulose acetate. Their surface areas are over 200 cm2 mg−1 with binding capacities of over 1012 DNA oligos mg−1, 10 TB mg−1 or 104 TB cm−3. This ‘dendricolloid’ stably holds DNA files better than bare DNA with an extrapolated ability to be repeatedly lyophilized and rehydrated over 170 times compared with 60 times, respectively. Accelerated ageing studies project half-lives of ~6,000 and 2 million years at 4 °C and −18 °C, respectively. The data can also be erased and replaced, and non-destructive file access is achieved through transcribing from distinct synthetic promoters. The resultant RNA molecules can be directly read via nanopore sequencing and can also be enzymatically computed to solve simplified 3 × 3 chess and sudoku problems. Our study establishes a feasible route for utilizing the high information density and parallel computational advantages of nucleic acids."

DNA "computer" solves sudoku and stores millions of GB for millennia "A full DNA computer is a step closer, thanks to a new technology that could store petabytes of data in DNA for thousands or even millions of years. The system can also process data, as demonstrated by solving sudoku puzzles."

For First Time, DNA Tech Offers Both Data Storage and Computing Functions (original news release)

A primordial DNA store and compute engine (no public access)

Novel filter may speed wastewater cleanup

Good news!

"... A new membrane could provide help, by dramatically improving a water filtering technology already used to clean up pollution from industrial sources and farms, researchers reported last week in Nature Sustainability. If they can be scaled up and commercialized, the authors argue, the new filters could sharply reduce the cost of turning wastewater into safe drinking water. ...

One option for cleaning up this wastewater is using “nanofiltration” membranes, which feature plastic films shot through with holes roughly 1 nanometer across to filter out pollutants such as organic compounds, metals, and microbes. (Desalination plants use even more finely perforated “reverse osmosis” membranes, with holes 0.1 nanometer across, to filter out dissolved salts.)

The sale of nanofiltration membranes is already a $1 billion business annually, according to the market research firm MarketsandMarkets. But a challenge for manufacturers has been controlling the range of pore sizes, which limits the membranes’ ability to exclude some contaminants ...

Now, ...  have come up with a way to make membranes with consistent 1-nanometer pores. The researchers started with two polymer building blocks: long, polelike molecules and short, connecting segments. When placed in solution with a porous plastic film, the poles and connector segments lined up on the film. The connectors bonded to specific sites on the poles, creating a sheet with ring-shaped voids, a bit like a chain-link fence. Stacking numerous sheets, the researchers formed a solid membrane. ..."

From the abstract:

"Membrane nanofiltration is widely used in various chemical separation and water purification processes. However, obtaining high water permeance and high solute removal selectivity for achieving energetically efficient precise separation in nanofiltration membranes remains challenging due to their inherent pore heterogeneity. Here we introduce a cinnamate-mediated polymerization method to fabricate nanofiltration membranes with highly homogenized and well-tailored nanopores to address this challenge. Our experimental data and molecular dynamics simulation results show that cinnamate-mediated polymerization can manipulate monomer diffusion and intermolecular void size to create a homogenized and tailored selective layer in a highly homogenized membrane. The obtained membrane exhibited a high water permeance of 104.3 l m−2 h−1 bar−1, which is substantially higher than that of the pristine membrane synthesized without cinnamate mediation, superior molecular sieving ability, excellent salt/dye separation factor and good operational stability, outperforming state-of-the-art membranes. Overall, this work enables the design and fabrication of nanofiltration membranes that combine other mutually exclusive properties for energetically efficient water purification applications towards a sustainable water–energy nexus."

Novel filter may speed wastewater cleanup | Science | AAAS

Polymeric membranes with highly homogenized nanopores for ultrafast water purification (no public access)

Scientists discover that like-charged particles can sometimes attract

Amazing stuff! Pardon, this is not the very latest research! However, this research maybe on to something fundamental?

"... It turns out that under certain conditions, like charges can actually attract each other instead. ... researchers ... demonstrated the attraction of like-charged particles in solutions.

The journey began ... back in the mid-2000s, when she came across the “like-charge attraction problem” while studying how DNA molecules squeezed into slit-like boxes. It was expected that the DNA would flatten into a pancake-like geometry, but instead it aligned alongside the edge of the box. Without any external forces being applied, the only explanation was that the DNA was attracted to the box, despite them both being negatively charged. ...

The like-charge problem is not new knowledge though. Different scientists over the years have tried to explain how like charges can attract, with some of the earliest works coming from Irving Langmuir back in the 1930s.

One of the areas where like-charge attraction is seen the most is within fluids, and the interaction of solid matter with fluids. ..."

"A study published today in Nature Nanotechnology shows that similarly charged particles can sometimes attract, rather than repel.

The team found that like-charged particles suspended in liquids can attract one another at long-range, depending on the solvent and the sign of the charge.

The study has immediate implications for processes that involve interactions in solution across various lengthscales, including self-assembly, crystallisation, and phase separation. ...
has demonstrated that similarly charged particles in solution can, in fact, attract each other over long distances. Just as surprisingly, the team found that the effect is different for positively and negatively charged particles, depending on the solvent. ...

Using a theory of interparticle interactions that considers the structure of the solvent at the interface, the team established that for negatively charged particles in water there is an attractive force that outweighs electrostatic repulsion at large separations, leading to cluster formation. For positively charged particles in water this solvent-driven interaction is always repulsive, and no clusters form.

This effect was found to be pH dependent: the team were able to control the formation (or not) of clusters for negatively charged particles by varying the pH. No matter the pH, the positively charged particles did not form clusters. ..."

From the abstract:

"The interaction between charged objects in solution is generally expected to recapitulate two central principles of electromagnetics: (1) like-charged objects repel, and (2) they do so regardless of the sign of their electrical charge. Here we demonstrate experimentally that the solvent plays a hitherto unforeseen but crucial role in interparticle interactions, and importantly, that interactions in the fluid phase can break charge-reversal symmetry. We show that in aqueous solution, negatively charged particles can attract at long range while positively charged particles repel. In solvents that exhibit an inversion of the net molecular dipole at an interface, such as alcohols, we find that the converse can be true: positively charged particles may attract whereas negatives repel. The observations hold across a wide variety of surface chemistries: from inorganic silica and polymeric particles to polyelectrolyte- and polypeptide-coated surfaces in aqueous solution. A theory of interparticle interactions that invokes solvent structuring at an interface captures the observations. Our study establishes a nanoscopic interfacial mechanism by which solvent molecules may give rise to a strong and long-ranged force in solution, with immediate ramifications for a range of particulate and molecular processes across length scales such as self-assembly, gelation and crystallization, biomolecular condensation, coacervation, and phase segregation."

Scientists discover that like-charged particles can sometimes attract – Physics World

It’s not only opposites that attract – new study shows like-charged particles can come together (original news release)

A charge-dependent long-ranged force drives tailored assembly of matter in solution (open access)

Fig. 1: Interparticle interactions in solution can break charge-reversal symmetry.

3D atomic details of next-generation alloys revealed for first time

Amazing stuff!

"Key takeaways

• A team led by ... researchers used an advanced imaging technique to develop 3D maps of the individual atoms of medium- and high-entropy alloys — a scientific first.
• Medium- and high-entropy alloys, developed about 20 years ago, show the capacity to be both tough and flexible in ways that everyday alloys such as steel aren’t.
• These findings, about how structure affects function in these alloys, may enable engineers to tune the alloys’ properties to produce far more durable objects and technologies.

... about 20 years ago, when researchers first developed medium- and high-entropy alloys, stable materials that combine hardness and flexibility in a way in which conventional alloys do not. (The “entropy” in the name indicates how disorderly the mixture of the elements in the alloys is.) ...
Medium-entropy alloys combine three or four metals in roughly equal amounts; high-entropy alloys combine five or more in the same way. In contrast, conventional alloys are mostly one metal with others intermixed in lower proportions. (Stainless steel, for example, can be three-quarters or more of iron.) ...

[Researchers] focused on a type of structural defect called a twin boundary, which is understood to be a key factor in medium- and high-entropy alloys’ unique combination of toughness and flexibility. Twinning happens when strain causes one section of a crystal matrix to bend diagonally while the atoms around it remain in their original configuration, forming mirror images on either side of the boundary. 

The researchers used an array of metals to make nanoparticles ... Six medium-entropy alloy nanoparticles combined nickel, palladium and platinum. Four nanoparticles of a high-entropy alloy combined cobalt, nickel, ruthenium, rhodium, palladium, silver, iridium and platinum. ...
The scientists liquified the metal at over 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit for five-hundredths of a second, then cooled it down in less than one-tenth that time. The idea is to fix the solid alloy in the same varied mixture of elements as a liquid. Along the way, the shock of the process induced twin boundaries in six of the 10 nanoparticles; four of those each had a pair of twins. ..."

From the abstract:

"Medium- and high-entropy alloys (M/HEAs) mix several principal elements with near-equiatomic composition and represent a model-shift strategy for designing previously unknown materials in metallurgy, catalysis and other fields. One of the core hypotheses of M/HEAs is lattice distortion, which has been investigated by different numerical and experimental techniques. However, determining the three-dimensional (3D) lattice distortion in M/HEAs remains a challenge. Moreover, the presumed random elemental mixing in M/HEAs has been questioned by X-ray and neutron studies, atomistic simulation, energy dispersive spectroscopy and electron diffraction, which suggest the existence of local chemical order in M/HEAs. However, direct experimental observation of the 3D local chemical order has been difficult because energy dispersive spectroscopy integrates the composition of atomic columns along the zone axes and diffuse electron reflections may originate from planar defects instead of local chemical order. Here we determine the 3D atomic positions of M/HEA nanoparticles using atomic electron tomography and quantitatively characterize the local lattice distortion, strain tensor, twin boundaries, dislocation cores and chemical short-range order (CSRO). We find that the high-entropy alloys have larger local lattice distortion and more heterogeneous strain than the medium-entropy alloys and that strain is correlated to CSRO. We also observe CSRO-mediated twinning in the medium-entropy alloys, that is, twinning occurs in energetically unfavoured CSRO regions but not in energetically favoured CSRO ones, which represents, to our knowledge, the first experimental observation of correlating local chemical order with structural defects in any material. We expect that this work will not only expand our fundamental understanding of this important class of materials but also provide the foundation for tailoring M/HEA properties through engineering lattice distortion and local chemical order."

3D atomic details of next-generation alloys revealed for first time | UCLA UCLA-led team maps medium- and high-entropy alloys and identifies potential to tune their properties, making them both stronger and more flexible

Three-dimensional atomic structure and local chemical order of medium- and high-entropy nanoalloys (no public access)

Atomic map of a high-entropy alloy nanoparticle shows different categories of elements in red, blue and green, and twinning boundaries in yellow.

Atomic electron tomography (AET) and its transformative impact on the physical sciences. (Top) Schematic diagram of AET, in which 2D images are measured with advanced electron microscopy by tilting a sample to many different orientations. The 3D structure of the sample is iteratively reconstructed from the images and the coordinates of individual atoms are localized. (Bottom) AET enables 3D imaging of crystal defects such as grain boundaries, stacking faults, dislocations and point defects at atomic resolution. The ability to precisely determine the coordinates of individual atoms allows direct measurements of atomic displacements and the full strain tensor in materials. (Source)

This Is How China's Huawei Shocked America With a Smartphone

Very recommendable!

New study identifies genes linked to high production of key antibody immunoglobulin G

Good news! Impressive work!

"Key takeaways

1. Researchers studying white blood cells identified an atlas of genes linked to high production and release of the most common type of antibody found in the human body, known as immunoglobulin G.
2. The finding could be a step toward new antibody-based treatments and improvements in the effectiveness of cell therapies.
3. The researchers used microscopic containers called nanovials, which were developed at UCLA, to capture the individual cells they studied.

... Scientists have known for decades that a population of white blood cells, called plasma B cells, make IgG. Plasma B cells are highly efficient, producing more than 10,000 IgG molecules every second. But the molecular mechanisms that enable plasma cells to secrete antibodies into the bloodstream are still not fully understood. ...

Their analysis found that genes involved with producing energy and eliminating abnormal proteins were even more important for high IgG secretion than the genes containing instructions for making the antibody itself. They also discovered that the presence of CD59, a gene that had not previously been linked to IgG secretion, is a better predictor of high-producing plasma cells than other genetic markers already associated with this cell type. ...

For instance, knowing which genes are associated with higher secretion of an antibody could be used by pharmaceutical makers to engineer cells that secrete large volumes of the antibody. That knowledge could also be applied to an emerging strategy that introduces engineered cells directly to patients’ bodies, such as the potential cell therapies under development by University of Washington immunologist Richard James, a co-corresponding author of the paper. ..."

From the abstract:

"The secreted products of cells drive many functions in vivo; however, methods to link this functional information to surface markers and transcriptomes have been lacking. By accumulating secretions close to secreting cells held within cavity-containing hydrogel nanovials, we demonstrate workflows to analyze the amount of IgG secreted from single human B cells and link this information to surface markers and transcriptomes from the same cells. Measurements using flow cytometry and imaging flow cytometry corroborate the association between IgG secretion and CD38/CD138. By using oligonucleotide-labeled antibodies we find that upregulation of pathways for protein localization to the endoplasmic reticulum and mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation are most associated with high IgG secretion, and uncover surrogate plasma cell surface markers (e.g., CD59) defined by the ability to secrete IgG. Altogether, this method links quantity of secretion with single-cell sequencing (SEC-seq) and enables researchers to fully explore the links between genome and function, laying the foundation for discoveries in immunology, stem cell biology, and beyond."

New study identifies genes linked to high production of key antibody | UCLA Discovery made possible by UCLA-developed nanotechnology

SEC-seq: association of molecular signatures with antibody secretion in thousands of single human plasma cells (open access)

Fig. 1: Workflow to link IgG secretion to surface markers and transcriptomes at the single-cell level.

Fig. 2: Linking IgG secretion to cell surface markers and intracellular machinery using flow cytometry.

Purifying water with just a few atoms

Amazing stuff! Water purification at the level of single atoms!

This research seems to describe a further and promising advancement of nanocatalysts.

Besides purification, I bet something similar can also be applied to desalination! Desalination is salvation!

"Due to their considerable efficiency, catalysts made of just a few atoms show great promise in the field of water treatment. In a new study, researchers looked into how to optimize the performance of these catalysts and make them viable for practical use. ...
a system with a catalyst using an ensemble of palladium atoms, designed to reduce the carcinogen bromate in water. They introduced the non-metal elements sulfur, nitrogen, and boron to the surrounds of atom ensembles. The overall results suggested an improvement in the system’s catalytic performance. ..."

From the significance and abstract:

"Significance

Substrate-anchored, single-atom catalysts (SACs) have emerged as a promising alternative to conventional nanocatalysts for various catalytic processes. The catalytic performance of SACs can be controlled by various synthetic strategies, including the manipulation of substrate atoms surrounding metal sites. This study examines whether the coordination environment (CE) of the palladium metal ensemble, a newly identified small-clustered structure with CE resembling that of SAC, can also be tuned by doping nonmetal elements onto the substrate. The results demonstrate that such CE manipulation could decrease the activation energy of the rate-limiting step and achieve efficient H2 dissociation for several important reductive catalytic schemes, establishing a new strategy to effectively engineer metal ensemble catalysts.

Abstract

Atomic dispersion of metal catalysts on a substrate accounts for the increased atomic efficiency of single-atom catalysts (SACs) in various catalytic schemes compared to the nanoparticle counterparts. However, lacking neighboring metal sites has been shown to deteriorate the catalytic performance of SACs in a few industrially important reactions, such as dehalogenation, CO oxidation, and hydrogenation. Metal ensemble catalysts (Mn), an extended concept to SACs, have emerged as a promising alternative to overcome such limitation. Inspired by the fact that the performance of fully isolated SACs can be enhanced by tailoring their coordination environment (CE), we here evaluate whether the CE of Mn can also be manipulated in order to enhance their catalytic activity. We synthesized a set of Pd ensembles (Pdn) on doped graphene supports (Pdn/X-graphene where X = O, S, B, and N). We found that introducing S and N onto oxidized graphene modifies the first shell of Pdn converting Pd–O to Pd–S and Pd–N, respectively. We further found that the B dopant significantly affected the electronic structure of Pdn by serving as an electron donor in the second shell. We examined the performance of Pdn/X-graphene toward selective reductive catalysis, such as bromate reduction, brominated organic hydrogenation, and aqueous-phase CO2 reduction. We observed that Pdn/N-graphene exhibited superior performance by lowering the activation energy of the rate-limiting step, i.e., H2 dissociation into atomic hydrogen. The results collectively suggest controlling the CE of SACs in an ensemble configuration is a viable strategy to optimize and enhance their catalytic performance."

Purifying water with just a few atoms | Yale School of Engineering & Applied Science

Enhancing the activity of Pd ensembles on graphene by manipulating coordination environment (no public access)

Superconductivity switches on and off in “magic-angle” graphene

Update: Just learnt from the first author of the paper that the temperatures during the experiments were the usual close to zero Kelvin range. She also pointed me to the preprint link, which is open to the public.

Amazing stuff! What is not clear from the article is at what temperature these experiments were conducted! Are we getting any closer to room temperature superconductivity?

"With some careful twisting and stacking, MIT physicists have revealed a new and exotic property in “magic-angle” graphene: superconductivity that can be turned on and off with an electric pulse, much like a light switch. ...
by stacking magic-angle graphene between two offset layers of boron nitride — a two-dimensional insulating material — the unique alignment of the sandwich structure enabled the researchers to turn graphene’s superconductivity on and off with a short electric pulse. ...

In their current study, the team fabricated a sandwich of carefully angled and stacked materials. The “cheese” of the sandwich consisted of magic-angle graphene — two graphene sheets, the top rotated slightly at the “magic” angle of 1.1 degrees with respect to the bottom sheet. Above this structure, they placed a layer of boron nitride, exactly aligned with the top graphene sheet. Finally, they placed a second layer of boron nitride below the entire structure and offset it by 30 degrees with respect to the top layer of boron nitride.

The team then measured the electrical resistance of the graphene layers as they applied a gate voltage. They found, as others have, that the twisted bilayer graphene switched electronic states, changing between insulating, conducting, and  superconducting states at certain known voltages. ...
each electronic state persisted rather than immediately disappearing once the voltage was removed — a property known as bistability. They found that, at a particular voltage, the graphene layers turned into a superconductor, and remained superconducting, even as the researchers removed this voltage. ..."

From the abstract:

"Electrical control of superconductivity is critical for nanoscale superconducting circuits including cryogenic memory elements, superconducting field-effect transistors (FETs) and gate-tunable qubits. Superconducting FETs operate through continuous tuning of carrier density, but no bistable superconducting FET, which could serve as a new type of cryogenic memory element, has been reported. Recently, gate hysteresis and resultant bistability in Bernal-stacked bilayer graphene aligned to its insulating hexagonal boron nitride gate dielectrics were discovered. Here we report the observation of this same hysteresis in magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene (MATBG) with aligned boron nitride layers. This bistable behaviour coexists alongside the strongly correlated electron system of MATBG without disrupting its correlated insulator or superconducting states. This all-van der Waals platform enables configurable switching between different electronic states of this rich system. To illustrate this new approach, we demonstrate reproducible bistable switching between the superconducting, metallic and correlated insulator states of MATBG using gate voltage or electric displacement field. These experiments unlock the potential to broadly incorporate this new switchable moiré superconductor into highly tunable superconducting electronics."

Study: Superconductivity switches on and off in “magic-angle” graphene | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology A quick electric pulse completely flips the material’s electronic properties, opening a route to ultrafast, brain-inspired, superconducting electronics.

Electrical switching of a bistable moiré superconductor (no public access)

MIT physicists have found a new way to switch superconductivity on and off in magic-angle graphene. This figure shows a device with two graphene layers in the middle (in dark gray and in inset). The graphene layers are sandwiched in between boron nitride layers (in blue and purple). The angle and alignment of each layer enables the researchers to turn superconductivity on and off in graphene with a short electric pulse.

Deep Reinforcement Learning for Atomic-scale precise Manipulation to assemble and arrange single atoms

Amazing stuff!

"Researchers used deep reinforcement learning to steer atoms into a lattice shape, with a view to building new materials or nanodevices.

In a very cold vacuum chamber, single atoms of silver form a star-like lattice. The precise formation is not accidental, and it wasn't constructed directly by human hands either. Researchers used a kind of artificial intelligence called deep reinforcement learning to steer the atoms, each a fraction of a nanometer in size, into the lattice shape. ..."

From the abstract:

"Atomic-scale manipulation in scanning tunneling microscopy has enabled the creation of quantum states of matter based on artificial structures and extreme miniaturization of computational circuitry based on individual atoms. The ability to autonomously arrange atomic structures with precision will enable the scaling up of nanoscale fabrication and expand the range of artificial structures hosting exotic quantum states. However, the a priori unknown manipulation parameters, the possibility of spontaneous tip apex changes, and the difficulty of modeling tip-atom interactions make it challenging to select manipulation parameters that can achieve atomic precision throughout extended operations. Here we use deep reinforcement learning (DRL) to control the real-world atom manipulation process. Several state-of-the-art reinforcement learning (RL) techniques are used jointly to boost data efficiency. The DRL agent learns to manipulate Ag adatoms on Ag(111) surfaces with optimal precision and is integrated with path planning algorithms to complete an autonomous atomic assembly system. The results demonstrate that state-of-the-art DRL can offer effective solutions to real-world challenges in nanofabrication and powerful approaches to increasingly complex scientific experiments at the atomic scale."

The smallest robotic arm you can imagine is controlled by artificial intelligence

Precise atom manipulation through deep reinforcement learning (open access)

Credits: Last Week in AI

Fig. 1: Atom manipulation with a DRL agent.

Nanosensors target enzymes to monitor and study cancer

Good news! Cancer is history (soon)! Treating cancer at nanoscale precision with multiscale (space and time) analysis! Wow! Very impressive work! This is only the beginning!

It appears humans are finally understanding and outsmarting cancer at nanoscale!!!

"... Sensitive tools for measuring protein or gene expression, even on the single cell level, have helped researchers understand the different cell types present in a tumor’s microenvironment and how this composition changes after treatments. However, these assays don’t necessarily show which proteins are active or relevant to tumor progression, or allow clinicians to noninvasively monitor the progress of the disease or its response to treatment. A protein could be present in a cancer cell as a bystander, for example, but not an active participant in its cellular transformations. Enzymes, which catalyze biochemical reactions inside cells, may give a clearer picture of which genes or proteins to target at a particular time. ...

researchers ... have developed a set of enzyme-targeting nanoscale tools to monitor cancer progression and treatment response in real time, map enzyme activity to precise locations within a tumor, and isolate relevant cell populations for analysis. ...
the nanosensors could be used by clinicians to tailor treatments to a patient’s specific cancer, and to monitor cancer progression and treatment response, while researchers could use them to better understand the molecular biology of cancer and develop new tools to diagnose, track, and treat the disease ...

For several years, the ... laboratory has been developing noninvasive urine tests for the detection of cancer, including colon, ovarian, and lung cancer. The tests rely on nanoparticles that interact with tumor proteins called proteases. Proteases are a type of enzyme that act as molecular scissors to cleave proteins and break them down into smaller components. Proteases help cancer cells escape from tumors by cutting through the extracellular network of proteins that holds cells in place.

The nanoparticles are coated with peptides (short protein fragments) that target cancer-linked proteases. When the nanoparticles arrive at the tumor site, the peptides are cut and release biomarkers that can be detected in the urine.

In the current study, the researchers tested whether they could use this technology not just to detect cancer, but to track the development of cancer and its response to treatments accurately and sensitively over time. The team created a panel of 14 nanoparticles designed to target proteases overexpressed in non-small cell lung cancer induced in a mouse model. These nanoparticles had been adapted to release barcoded peptides when they encounter dysregulated enzymes in the tumor microenvironment.

Each nanosensor was able to track different patterns of protease activity, which changed dramatically as the tumor progressed. After treatment with a lung cancer-targeting drug, the researchers were able to find signs tumor regression quickly, within just three days of administering treatment. ...

Having identified nanosensors of interest, researchers mapped where in the tumor microenvironment the enzymes acting on these sensors were active. They adapted their nanoprobes to leave behind fluorescent tags when they are cleaved from the nanosensor, assigning different tags to different proteases. After applying the nanoprobes to samples of lung tissue, they looked for patterns in how the tags were distributed.

One tag resulted in a curious spindle-like pattern that turned out to belong to the tumor vasculature. Researchers pinpointed the protease activity to specific types of cells: endothelial cells, which line blood vessels, and pericytes, which regulate vascular function and are actively recruited in angiogenesis — one of the archetypal hallmarks of cancer cell growth. ...
Ultimately, however, the team envisions panels of nanoprobes targeting several important features of cancer simultaneously and noninvasively in patients. Other hallmarks of cancer include proliferative signaling, the evasion of growth suppressors, genome instability, resistance to cell death, deregulated metabolism, and activation of invasion and metastasis. Because cancer alters protease activity across all of these processes, the team’s nanoprobes could be designed to target these different processes, with the aim of providing a comprehensive picture of tumor activity driving the disease. ..."

From the abstract:

"Diverse processes in cancer are mediated by enzymes, which most proximally exert their function through their activity. High-fidelity methods to profile enzyme activity are therefore critical to understanding and targeting the pathological roles of enzymes in cancer. Here, we present an integrated set of methods for measuring specific protease activities across scales, and deploy these methods to study treatment response in an autochthonous model of Alk-mutant lung cancer. We leverage multiplexed nanosensors and machine learning to analyze in vivo protease activity dynamics in lung cancer, identifying significant dysregulation that includes enhanced cleavage of a peptide, S1, which rapidly returns to healthy levels with targeted therapy. Through direct on-tissue localization of protease activity, we pinpoint S1 cleavage to the tumor vasculature. To link protease activity to cellular function, we design a high-throughput method to isolate and characterize proteolytically active cells, uncovering a pro-angiogenic phenotype in S1-cleaving cells. These methods provide a framework for functional, multiscale characterization of protease dysregulation in cancer."

Nanosensors target enzymes to monitor and study cancer | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology By analyzing enzyme activity at the organism, tissue, and cellular scales, new sensors could provide new tools to clinicians and cancer researchers.

Multiscale profiling of protease activity in cancer (open access)

Fig. 1: Multiscale profiling of protease activity in cancer

Better battery designs are coming

Better batteries are urgently needed for all the electronic devices and appliances we use on a daily basis!

"Unlike other companies that focus on improving battery chemistry, Addionics is focused on the physics of a specific part of the battery, the electric current collector.

The current collector serves as the substrate of a battery’s electrodes. ...

“Using nanotechnology, we can find space that’s not well utilized and make it more efficient,” ... “That way we get more active material in the same space, which increases the range by keeping the contact between the metal and the active material very high while minimizing internal resistance, enabling higher currents.”..."

A battery that aims to disrupt the history of battery technology - ISRAEL21c

How Transforming is Design Industry (Addionics white paper)

Nanodiamond quantum thermometer measures the temperature of worms

Amazing stuff!

"One of the reasons is that the temperature within a living organism is a direct measure of the biological activities happening inside. Going down to the submicron-scale temperature range, as in this new work, should provide detailed information on cellular and molecular activities. "

Nanodiamond quantum thermometer measures the temperature of worms – Physics World

Hydrogen To Supply Humanity With Cheap, Clean, And Abundant Energy

Posted: 2/4/2018  Updated: 7/27/2019

Update Of 7/27/2019

More good news about better catalysts: Ruthenium catalyst sets new efficiency record for water splitting (2/12/2019)

“An international team of scientists has synthesized a carbon nanowire doped with ruthenium and nitrogen that significantly outperforms conventional platinum-based catalysts for producing hydrogen from water. The team attributes the improved catalytic activity to individual ruthenium atoms embedded in the carbon matrix, rather than the presence of ruthenium nanoparticles.” (emphasis added)

Original Post

Trigger 

Just read New water-splitting method could open path to hydrogen economy Technique efficiently generates hydrogen from water. Researchers of the Washington State University discovered catalysts made from nanomaterials consisting of inexpensive nickel and iron.

If this turns out to be right, this could be a huge game changer how humans will produce energy going forward.

Implications

Another triumph of human ingenuity!

The global economic benefits cannot even be imagined!

No more energy shortages for humanity in the foreseeable future. 

Good riddance to all the windmills and solar panels spoiling our environment.

Beware Of Nanotechnology Scares

Today, the Neue Zuericher Zeitung published an interesting article (German language) about how immature the research into health risks potentially caused by nano particles is.

Poor Quality Of Health Risk Research

To summarize the above newspaper article:

·     Claims are being made that not enough funds are available for research into health risks

·    There are only few experts so far in the field of toxicology of nanotechnology

·   Almost any research is published in this field, therefore it attracts incompetent newcomers

·    Published research by far does not yet meet strict criteria of scientific research procedures. E.g. researchers in the field abuse overdosing of nano particles; some research reports lack positive control tests and so on

Conclusion

If you see an article published about purported dangers of nanotechnology, take it with a big grain of salt.