Atomic-scale Manipulation

NANOTECH RESEARCH

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards & Technology have taken one step closer to making real atomic-scale devices. Joseph A. Stroscio and Robert J. Celotta, both physicists at NIST, used a scanning tunneling microscope to drag a cobalt atom over a copper surface and found that they were able to distinguish between two different crystal-packed binding sites [Science, published online Sept. 9, http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/1102370v1].

According to Stroscio, this experiment is a new form of measurement, which he calls "atom-based metrology," where the Co atom is serving as a transducer to measure the local properties of a surface. In this work, the Co atom transducer was observed switching from one binding site to another, which told the researchers how to control and improve atom manipulation.

"The main impact of this work is that we better understand the atom manipulation process so we can make it more reliable and extend it more easily to other systems, such as placing atoms on semiconductor substrates to make real nanoscale devices," Stroscio tells C&EN.