Advertisement

If you have an ACS member number, please enter it here so we can link this account to your membership. (optional)

ACS values your privacy. By submitting your information, you are gaining access to C&EN and subscribing to our weekly newsletter. We use the information you provide to make your reading experience better, and we will never sell your data to third party members.

ENJOY UNLIMITED ACCES TO C&EN

Nanomaterials

Chemistry In Pictures

Chemistry in Pictures: No strings attached

by Manny Morone
April 29, 2019

A video of a droplet floating in midair in an acoustic levitator while a gloved hand reaches over with a pipette to add a smaller drop of red solution to the floating drop, which quivers when it is touched.
Credit: Qianqian Shi
A micrograph of a bilayer of gold nanoparticles.
Credit: Qianqian Shi

Although many lab-scale experiments happen inside a flask, glassware can interfere with some reactions going on inside them. That’s why Qianqian Shi, a research fellow at Monash University working with Monash professor Wenlong Cheng and Duyang Zang of Northwestern Polytechnical University, performed this self-assembly reaction in midair. First, Shi levitates a drop of water using ultrasound waves coming out of the emitter above the drop. Then she adds a suspension containing gold nanocubes on the surface of the water droplet. Because there’s no glassware holding the droplet, the nanocubes quickly spread across its entire outer surface, creating a skin. After about 30–60 min, the water evaporates and the skin of nanocubes collapses, leaving behind a flat bilayer (micrograph shown) of the gold nanocubes floating in the ultrasound wave. Nanoassemblies like these bilayers may have applications in anticounterfeiting and ultrathin lenses.

Credit: Qianqian Shi

Do science. Take pictures. Win money. Enter our photo contest here.

Chemistry in Pictures: Midair crystallization

Lab Levitation

Nanocube-Nanotube Biosensors.

Article:

This article has been sent to the following recipient:

0 /1 FREE ARTICLES LEFT THIS MONTH Remaining
Chemistry matters. Join us to get the news you need.