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Materials science

Stirring stuff

Nature volume 448, pages 876–877 (2007)Cite this article

Take silicon, soak in water, add acid — and stir. This simple new recipe for the self-assembly of complex microstructures belies an involved sequence of hydrophobic, electrostatic and van der Waals interactions.

In folding its proteins and constructing its complex membranes, nature uses self-assembly: bathed in water or another liquid, tiny building-blocks come together by virtue of their shape and interactions. As they report in the journal Small, Onoe et al.1 adapt these natural processes for their own designs. They describe a method for assembling parts just 10 micrometres across into complex, three-dimensional objects, and go on to build up chains of interlocking rings. The research is another step towards the ultimate goal of building electrical or optical circuits, or even microscopic machines, from components at micrometre and smaller scales.

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Figure 1: Self assembly in action.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, David J. Pine is at the Center for Soft Matter Research, New York University, 4 Washington Place, New York, New York 10003, USA. pine@nyu.edu,

    David J. Pine

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  1. David J. Pine
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Pine, D. Stirring stuff. Nature 448, 876–877 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/448876a

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