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Published online 24 September 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2008.1130
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Ultrasmooth mirror could herald birth of a new microscope
Helium atoms could probe the smallest structures with a light touch.
A microscope that studies the most delicate materials by bouncing helium atoms off their surfaces could be made within a year, thanks to the development of the world's smoothest mirror.
That's the claim from Rodolfo Miranda of the Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain, whose research team has created the mirror by depositing a few atom-thick layers of lead onto an almost perfectly smooth silicon surface at 114 kelvin (-159 °C).
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