Tuesday, September 21, 2004
Just recently at Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers developed an electron microscope image that can distinguish the individual, dumbbell-shaped atoms of a silicon crystal.
In a Sept. 17 article in the journal Science, Pennycook and colleagues wrote that they have achieved an image resolution at 0.6 angstrom, breaking the previous record of 0.7 angstrom which the lab set earlier this year.
An angstrom, the smallest wavelength of light, is about 500,000 times smaller than the thickness of a human hair.
For its latest findings, the Oak Ridge lab used a 300-kilovolt state-of-the-art electron microscope aided by new computerized imaging technology developed by Nion Co. of Kirkland, Wash.
Researchers said the next frontier will be seeing atoms in three dimensions.
***I've always wanted to have a room in my house where the entire ceiling was made of telescope glass. So, you could go into the room at night and see all the stars. Due to the glass they would be like right in the room with you. How cool is that. And with new discoveries like this, perhaps I could see the little people who live on the stars:)
In a Sept. 17 article in the journal Science, Pennycook and colleagues wrote that they have achieved an image resolution at 0.6 angstrom, breaking the previous record of 0.7 angstrom which the lab set earlier this year.
An angstrom, the smallest wavelength of light, is about 500,000 times smaller than the thickness of a human hair.
For its latest findings, the Oak Ridge lab used a 300-kilovolt state-of-the-art electron microscope aided by new computerized imaging technology developed by Nion Co. of Kirkland, Wash.
Researchers said the next frontier will be seeing atoms in three dimensions.
***I've always wanted to have a room in my house where the entire ceiling was made of telescope glass. So, you could go into the room at night and see all the stars. Due to the glass they would be like right in the room with you. How cool is that. And with new discoveries like this, perhaps I could see the little people who live on the stars:)