Nanomanipulation

20/04/2022

Our delegation is visiting CERN this week to discuss collaboration in CLIC (Compact linear collider) and FCC (Future circular collider).🤩

Sel nädalal on ERA Chair (Euroopa Teadusruumi õppetool) MATTERi meeskond visiidil Šveitsis, Euroopa Tuumauuringute Keskuses (CERN).

Visiidi eesmärk on tugevdada koostööd CERNiga, eriti kompaktse lineaarkiirendi (CLIC) ning tuleviku ringpõrguti (FLC) arendusprojektides.

"Kohtume CERNi teadlastega, et arutada meie töörühma panust tuleviku ringpõrguti arendamisse. Teeme ettekanded ja osaleme teadusdiskussioonides kompaktse lineaarkiirendi teadlastega, kellega meil on pikaajaline koostöö. Meie panus on kiirendite materjalidesse, peamiselt keskendume vaakumis toimuvate elektriliste läbilöökide uurimisele," selgitas ERA Chair õppetooli hoidja Andreas Kyritsakis.

Ühtlasi kirjutab täna Tartu Ülikooli rektor CERN-is teiste seas alla ühiste kavatsuste memorandumile, et arendada koostööd tuleviku ringpõrguti projektis.

06/01/2022

COPPER MICROFOREST

Spectacular wintry landscape greets us inside a scanning electron microscope (SEM) when we look at the porous copper electrodes produced by our colleagues from the Institute of Chemistry. Besides being delight to the eye of the SEM operator, it has also important practical value serving as a multifunctional electrode materials for green energy storage and conversion devices.

02/02/2021

Japanese scientists captured the moment of Salt (NaCl) crystal formation from disorder. Read more: https://www.sciencealert.com/watch-the-first-ever-atomic-scale-video-of-salt-crystals-forming

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SK6PCPVPja8&feature=emb_title&ab_channel=%E6%9D%B1%E4%BA%AC%E5%A4%A7%E5%AD%A6%E5%A4%A7%E5%AD%A6%E9%99%A2%E7%90%86%E5%AD%A6%E7%B3%BB%E7%A0%94%E7%A9%B6%E7%A7%91%E3%83%BB%E7%90%86%E5%AD%A6%E9%83%A8SchoolofScience%2CTheUniversityofTokyo

The formation of crystals is one of the most commonplace processes you can probably think of. Every time you freeze water into ice cubes, for instance, you're creating crystalline structures. There's even a fun experiment you can do to grow salt crys

25/09/2020

A new nanomanipulation related ERA-Chair is starting at the University of Tartu. https://matter.ee/
We hope to share new cool results with You soon!

ERA Chair MATTER combines the fields of multiscale computer simulations, nanomanipulation, nanotechnology applications and biomedical outreach!

04/12/2019

Bacteria in love 🥰

10/12/2018

Insects can be a bit creepy when observed at a close distance. Here is a scanning electron microscope image of the green lacewing that often lives in our houses. It makes no harm, but has sharp thorns all around its body including wings and even some on the eye. And, of course, we touched it with our nanomanipulator. In the name of science. And just for fun.
SEM images by Sergei Vlassov. Color photo by David Chapman.

08/03/2018

On a scanning electron microscope image everything is grey. Sometimes we want to know what material we are looking at right now. With the help of X-rays we can find out. The blue curve is the amount of silicon and violet is the amount of gold along the line going from up to down in the middle of the image.

Skaneerivas elektronmikroskoobis kõik on hall. Mõnikord on meil vaja teada, mis materjali me parasjagu vaatame. Sellises olukorras on meile abiks röntgenkiired. Sinine kõver näitab räni sisaldust ja lilla kulla sisaldust pilti läbiva joonel.

27/02/2018

What or who are you? Found it on a surface of a Pt/Ir wire. We just gave him a shovel. Original image with scalebar is provided in comment section.
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Ja kes tahaks sina olla, kui sa väikseks saad. See härra oli Pt/Ir traadi pinnal. Me andsime talle labida. Originaalpilt skaalaga on kommentaarides.

22/02/2018

You can use Fairy to wash your dishes, but you'd better use plasma to clean things that are to be inserted into high vacuum of electron microscope chamber. Scanning electron microscope sample holder (bottom of the image) inside plasma cleaner.

Fairy'ga saab küll nõud puhtaks, aga kui midagi on vaja pista skaneeriva elektronmikroskoobi kambrisse, võiks kasutada plasmat. Pildil proovihoidja (pildi alumise serva juures) töötavas plasmakambris.

08/02/2018

Not a commercial for smoking! In the previous post it was shown that the melting temperature of gold or silver nanowires is much lower than for objects made from the same material which can be seen with the naked eye. Coating nanowires with oxide layer could protect them from the heat to an extent as can be seen on the present images. After heating for 2 hours at 600 °C silver starts to swell out of the shell, breaking it and piling up at one end of the wire, forming a “cloud of smoke”. This image won a Horisont’s special prize at the 2017. Vikipeedia science photo competition and you can find more details on “Nanocigaette” from the latest edition of Horisont.

Tegu pole suitsetamise reklaamiga! Eelmises postitusest võis lugeda, et kullast või hõbedast nanotraatide sulamistemperatuur on tunduvalt madalam kui samast materjalist palja silmaga nähtavatel objektidel. Nanotraate on võimalik kaitsta kuumuse eest kattes neid oksiidikihiga, kuid vaid teatud maani nagu juuresolevalt pildilt näha. Pärast 2 tundi 600 °C juures kuumutamist hakkab hõbe oksiidist kestast välja paisuma, lõhkudes kesta ja kuhjudes traadi otsa, moodustades niiviisi „suitsupilve“. Antud pilt pälvis Vikipeedia 2017. aasta teadufotovõistlusel Horisondi eriauhinna ning „Nanosigaretist“ saab lähemalt lugeda värskes Horisondis.

31/01/2018

Melting temperature of gold is 1,064 °C, and silver melts at 962 °C.
What will happen if you place your gold wedding ring or silver necklace into oven for 15 minutes, lets say, 300 °C? Nothing that you would notice with your naked eye.
Maybe 500 °C? 600°C and several hours? No, still nothing. It is still very far from melting point.
But here is our advice - don't give any heat to your gold or silver nanowires because you will destroy them. Already at 150-200°C nanowires will decompose at intersection and starting from around 400°C your nice and long nanowire will turn into bunch of nanopartilces.
For more details check Vigonski et al., 2018, Nanotechnology 29 (1), 015704.

Kuld sulab temperatuuril 1064 °C ja hõbe 962 °C. Mis juhtub kullast abielusõrmusega või hõbedast kaelakeega kui see jätta ahju veerand tunniks näiteks 300 kraadiga? Palja silmaga vaadates mitte midagi.
Aga kui ahju kuumutada 500 või 600 kraadini või kui jätta ehted ahju mitmeks tunniks? Pole põhjust muretsemiseks. Sulamistemperatuur on veel kaugel.
Kuid hoiatus - ärge kuumutage oma kulla või hõbeda nanotraate, sest need hakkavad üksteisega kokkupuutel sulama juba 150-200 kraadi juures. Ja jõudes 400°C-ni muutuvad ilusad pikad nanotraadid nanoosakesteks. Rohkem detaile leiate Vigonski et al., 2018, Nanotechnology 29 (1), 015704.