Monthly Archives: August 2013

Archimedes as in nano-archimedes and graphene nanoscrolls

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Over the last 10 days or so, I’ve stumbled across two references to Archimedes in my constant search for information on nanotechnology. Not remembering my ancient Greeks very well, I found this about him on Wikipedia (Note: Links and footnotes have been removed),

Archimedes of Syracuse (Greek: Ἀρχιμήδης; c. 287 BC – c. 212 BC) was a Greek mathematician, physicist, engineer, inventor, and astronomer. Although few details of his life are known, he is regarded as one of the leading scientists in classical antiquity. Among his advances in physics are the foundations of hydrostatics, statics and an explanation of the principle of the lever. He is credited with designing innovative machines, including siege engines and the screw pump that bears his name. Modern experiments have tested claims that Archimedes designed machines capable of lifting attacking ships out of the water and setting ships on fire using an array of mirrors.

Archimedes is generally considered to be the greatest mathematician of antiquity and one of the greatest of all time.

His influence lives on as he’s referenced in an Aug. 15, 2013 news item on Nanowerk concerning graphene nanoscrolls,

Researchers at Umeå University, together with researchers at Uppsala University and Stockholm University, show in a new study how nitrogen doped graphene can be rolled into perfect Archimedean nano scrolls by adhering magnetic iron oxide nanoparticles on the surface of the graphene sheets. The new material may have very good properties for application as electrodes in for example Li-ion batteries.

The Aug. 15, 2013 Umeå University press release,which originated the news item, provides technical details,

In the study the researchers have modified the graphene by replacing some of the carbon atoms by nitrogen atoms. By this method they obtain anchoring sites for the iron oxide nanoparticles that are decorated onto the graphene sheets in a solution process. In the decoration process one can control the type of iron oxide nanoparticles that are formed on the graphene surface, so that they either form so called hematite (the reddish form of iron oxide that often is found in nature) or maghemite, a less stable and more magnetic form of iron oxide.

“Interestingly we observed that when the graphene is decorated by maghemite, the graphene sheets spontaneously start to roll into perfect Archimedean nano scrolls, while when decorated by the less magnetic hematite nanoparticles the graphene remain as open sheets, says Thomas Wågberg, Senior lecturer at the Department of Physics at Umeå University.

The nanoscrolls can be visualized as traditional “Swiss rolls” where the sponge-cake represents the graphene, and the creamy filling is the iron oxide nanoparticles. The graphene nanoscrolls are however around one million times thinner.

The results that now have been published in Nature Communications are conceptually interesting for several reasons. It shows that the magnetic interaction between the iron oxide nanoparticles is one of the main effects behind the scroll formation. It also shows that the nitrogen defects in the graphene lattice are necessary for both stabilizing a sufficiently high number of maghemite nanoparticles, and also responsible for “buckling” the graphene sheets and thereby lowering the formation energy of the nanoscrolls.

The process is extraordinary efficient. Almost 100 percent of the graphene sheets are scrolled. After the decoration with maghemite particles the research team could not find any open graphene sheets.

Moreover, they showed that by removing the iron oxide nanoparticles by acid treatment the nanoscrolls again open up and go back to single graphene sheets

The researchers have an image showing a partially reopened scroll (despite references to Archimedes and swiss rolls, I see a plant leaf or flower unfurling),

Caption: Snapshot of a partially re-opened nanoscroll. The atomic layer thick graphene resembles a thin foil with some few wrinkles. [Courtesy of Umeå University]

Caption: Snapshot of a partially re-opened nanoscroll. The atomic layer thick graphene resembles a thin foil with some few wrinkles. [Courtesy of Umeå University]

Here’s a link to and a citation for the published paper,

Tiva Sharifi, Eduardo Gracia-Espino, Hamid Reza Barzegar, Xueen Jia, Florian Nitze, Guangzhi Hu, Per Nordblad, Cheuk-Wai Tai, and Thomas Wågberg: Formation of nitrogen-doped graphene nanoscrolls by adsorption of magnetic γ-Fe2O3 nanoparticles, Nature Communications (2013), DOI:10.1038/ncomms3319.

The article is behind a paywall.

The other Archimedes reference is regarding a new website, nano-archimedes, mentioned in an Aug. 10, 2013 news item on Nanowerk,

Nano-archimedes is a Technology Computer Aided Design tool (TCAD) for the simulation of electron transport in nanometer scale semiconductor devices (nanodevices). It is based on the Wigner equation, a convenient reformulation of the Schrödinger equation in terms of a phase-space, which allows the application of stochastic particles methods and the extension towards mixed state kinetic descriptions such as the Wigner-Boltzmann equation.

There’s more on the nano-archimedes homepage,

It is an experimental code for validation and analysis of the compatibility of existing quantum particle concepts in algorithmic schemes. Our preliminary results have clearly shown that time-dependent, full quantum and multi-dimensional simulations of electron transport can be achieved with no special computational requirements. The code is already able to simulate time dependent phenomena such as two-dimensional wave phase breaking and single electron ballistic transport with open boundary conditions aiming to have, very soon, full quantum self-consistent calculations for nanodevices.

nano-archimedes runs both on serial and parallel machines and the parallelization scheme is based on OpenMP – a standard library for parallel calculations. The code is entirely written in C and can compile on a huge variety of machines without any particular effort. The only external dependence is OpenMP, everything else is embedded in the code to make it truly cross-platform.

I found the background of the team members behind this effort rather interesting, from the Team page,

Main developer and principal maintainer of the code:
Jean Michel Sellier, IICT, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Bulgaria, supported by the AComIn project.

Main developer, theory and physical analysis:
Mihail Nedjalkov, Institute for Microelectronics, TU Wien, Austria.

Advisory board:
Ivan Dimov, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Bulgaria.
Siegfried Selberherr, Institute for Microelectronics, TU Wien, Austria.

Website Master:
Marc Sellier, working at Selliweb, Italy.

I don’t often have a chance to mention Bulgaria and I expect that’s due to the fact that my linguistic skills are largely English with a little French flavour thrown into the mix. The consequence is that I’m confined and while  I realize English is the dominant language in science there’s still a lot of scientific materials that never finds its way into English and I don’t trust machine translations.

Battery-free wireless devices and a true internet of things in our future say University of Washington (state) scientists

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An Aug. 13, 2013 University of Washington (state) news release by Michelle Ma (also on EurekAlert) features a technique that could render batteries for a new wireless communication network unnecessary,

University of Washington engineers have created a new wireless communication system that allows devices to interact with each other without relying on batteries or wires for power.

The new communication technique, which the researchers call “ambient backscatter,” takes advantage of the TV and cellular transmissions that already surround us around the clock. Two devices communicate with each other by reflecting the existing signals to exchange information. The researchers built small, battery-free devices with antennas that can detect, harness and reflect a TV signal, which then is picked up by other similar devices.

The technology could enable a network of devices and sensors to communicate with no power source or human attention needed.

“We can repurpose wireless signals that are already around us into both a source of power and a communication medium,” said lead researcher Shyam Gollakota, a UW assistant professor of computer science and engineering. “It’s hopefully going to have applications in a number of areas including wearable computing, smart homes and self-sustaining sensor networks.”

The researchers published their results at the Association for Computing Machinery’s Special Interest Group on Data Communication 2013 conference in Hong Kong, which began Aug. 13 [2013]. They have received the conference’s best-paper award for their research.

“Our devices form a network out of thin air,” said co-author Joshua Smith, a UW associate professor of computer science and engineering and of electrical engineering. “You can reflect these signals slightly to create a Morse code of communication between battery-free devices.”

Here’s a little information about the technique (from the new release),

The researchers tested the ambient backscatter technique with credit card-sized prototype devices placed within several feet of each other. For each device the researchers built antennas into ordinary circuit boards that flash an LED light when receiving a communication signal from another device.

Groups of the devices were tested in a variety of settings in the Seattle area, including inside an apartment building, on a street corner and on the top level of a parking garage. These locations ranged from less than half a mile away from a TV tower to about 6.5 miles away.

They found that the devices were able to communicate with each other, even the ones farthest from a TV tower. The receiving devices picked up a signal from their transmitting counterparts at a rate of 1 kilobit per second when up to 2.5 feet apart outdoors and 1.5 feet apart indoors. This is enough to send information such as a sensor reading, text messages and contact information.

It’s also feasible to build this technology into devices that do rely on batteries, such as smartphones. It could be configured so that when the battery dies, the phone could still send text messages by leveraging power from an ambient TV signal.

The applications are endless, the researchers say, and they plan to continue advancing the capacity and range of the ambient backscatter communication network.

The researchers have a produced a video demonstrating  ambient backscatter (for anyone not familiar with the term RF, it’s radio frequency),

If I understand this rightly, ambient backscatter takes advantage of the signals already present in the atmosphere, which means these new battery-free devices are dependent on other devices which do need batteries, cell towers, etc.(ETA Aug. 1, 2013:  as well as wireline] devices otherwise there won’t be any ambient backscatter.

Cyborgian dance at McGill University (Canada)

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As noted in the Canadian Council of Academies report ((State of Science and Technology in Canada, 2012), which was mentioned in my Dec. 28, 2012 posting, the field of visual and performing arts is an area of strength and that is due to one province, Québec. Mark Wilson’s Aug. 13, 2013 article for Fast Company and Paul Ridden’s Aug. 7, 2013 article for gizmag.com about McGill University’s Instrumented Bodies: Digital Prostheses for Music and Dance Performance seem to confirm Québec’s leadership.

From Wilson’s Aug. 13, 2013 article (Note: A link has been removed),

One is a glowing exoskeleton spine, while another looks like a pair of cyborg butterfly wings. But these aren’t just costumes; they’re wearable, functional art.

In fact, the team of researchers from the IDML (Input Devices and Music Interaction Laboratory [at McGill University]) who are responsible for the designs go so far as to call their creations “prosthetic instruments.”

Ridden’s Aug. 7, 2013 article offers more about the project’s history and technology,

For the last three years, a small research team at McGill University has been working with a choreographer, a composer, dancers and musicians on a project named Instrumented Bodies. Three groups of sensor-packed, internally-lit digital music controllers that attach to a dancer’s costume have been developed, each capable of wirelessly triggering synthesized music as the performer moves around the stage. Sounds are produced by tapping or stroking transparent Ribs or Visors, or by twisting, turning or moving Spines. Though work on the project continues, the instruments have already been used in a performance piece called Les Gestes which toured Canada and Europe during March and April.

Both articles are interesting but Wilson’s is the fast read and Ridden’s gives you information you can’t find by looking up the Instrumented Bodies: Digital Prostheses for Music and Dance Performance project webpage,

These instruments are the culmination of a three-year long project in which the designers worked closely with dancers, musicians, composers and a choreographer. The goal of the project was to develop instruments that are visually striking, utilize advanced sensing technologies, and are rugged enough for extensive use in performance.

The complex, transparent shapes are lit from within, and include articulated spines, curved visors and ribcages. Unlike most computer music control interfaces, they function both as hand-held, manipulable controllers and as wearable, movement-tracking extensions to the body. Further, since the performers can smoothly attach and detach the objects, these new instruments deliberately blur the line between the performers’ bodies and the instrument being played.

…

The prosthetic instruments were designed and developed by Ph.D. researchers Joseph Malloch and Ian Hattwick [and Marlon Schumacher] under the supervision of IDMIL director Marcelo Wanderley. Starting with sketches and rough foam prototypes for exploring shape and movement, they progressed through many iterations of the design before arriving at the current versions. The researchers made heavy use of digital fabrication technologies such as laser-cutters and 3D printers, which they accessed through the McGill University School of Architecture and the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Music Media and Technology, also hosted by McGill.

Each of the nearly thirty working instruments produced for the project has embedded sensors, power supplies and wireless data transceivers, allowing a performer to control the parameters of music synthesis and processing in real time through touch, movement, and orientation. The signals produced by the instruments are routed through an open-source peer-to-peer software system the IDMIL team has developed for designing the connections between sensor signals and sound synthesis parameters.

For those who prefer to listen and watch, the researchers have created a video documentary,

I usually don’t include videos that run past 5 mins. but I’ve made an exception for this almost 15 mins. documentary.

I was trying to find mention of a dancer and/or choreographer associated with this project and found a name along with another early stage participant, choreographer, Isabelle Van Grimde, and composer, Sean Ferguson, in Ridden’s article.

New York University/Caltech grant is part of the NSF’s Origami Design for Integration of Self-assembling Systems for Engineering Innovation (ODISSEI) program

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The US National Science Foundation (NSF) has an origami program,  Origami Design for Integration of Self-assembling Systems for Engineering Innovation (ODISSEI), which recently announced a $2M grant to New York University (NYU) and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) to create new nanomaterials according to an Aug. 6, 2013 news item on Nanowerk,

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded New York University researchers and their colleagues at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) a $2 million grant to develop cutting-edge nanomaterials that hold promise for improving the manufacturing of advanced materials, biofuels, and other industrial products.

Under the grant, the scientists will develop biomimetic materials with revolutionary properties—these molecules will self-replicate, evolve, and adopt three-dimensional structures a billionth of a meter in size by combining DNA-guided self-assembly with the centuries-old art of origami folding.

The Aug. 5, 2013 NYU press release, which originated the news item,  provides details about the researchers and the project,

The four-year grant is part of the NSF’s Origami Design for Integration of Self-assembling Systems for Engineering Innovation (ODISSEI) program and includes NYU Chemistry Professors Nadrian Seeman and James Canary and NYU Physics Professor Paul Chaikin. They will team up with Caltech’s William A. Goddard, III and Si-ping Han.

Others involved in the project are molecular biologists John Rossi and Lisa Scherer of City of Hope Medical Center and mathematicians Joanna Ellis-Monaghan and Greta Pangborn of Saint Michael’s College in Vermont.

The work will build upon recent breakthroughs in the field of structural DNA nanotechnology, which Seeman founded more than three decades ago and is now pursued by laboratories across the globe. His creations allow him to arrange pieces and form specific molecules with precision—similar to the way a robotic automobile factory can be told what kind of car to make.

Previously, Seeman has created three-dimensional DNA structures, a scientific advance bridging the molecular world to the world where we live. To do this, he and his colleagues created DNA crystals by making synthetic sequences of DNA that have the ability to self-assemble into a series of 3D triangle-like motifs. The creation of the crystals was dependent on putting “sticky ends”—small cohesive sequences on each end of the motif—that attach to other molecules and place them in a set order and orientation. The make-up of these sticky ends allows the motifs to attach to each other in a programmed fashion.

Recently, the Seeman and Chaikin labs teamed up to develop artificial structures that can self-replicate, a process that has the potential to yield new types of materials. In the natural world, self-replication is ubiquitous in all living entities, but artificial self-replication had previously been elusive. Their work marked the first steps toward a general process for self-replication of a wide variety of arbitrarily designed “seeds”. The seeds are made from DNA tile motifs that serve as letters arranged to spell out a particular word. The replication process preserves the letter sequence and the shape of the seed and hence the information required to produce further generations. Self-replication enables the evolution of molecules to optimize particular properties via selection processes.

Under the NSF grant, the researchers will aim to take these innovations to the next level: the creation of self-replicating 3D arrays. To do so, the collaborators will aim to fold replicating 1D and 2D arrays into 3D shapes in a manner similar to paper origami—a complex and delicate process.

In meeting this challenge, they will adopt tools from graph theory and origami mathematics to develop algorithms to direct self-assembling DNA nanostructures and their origami folds. The mathematical component of the endeavor will be supplemented by the artistic expertise of Portland, Ore.-based sculptor Julian Voss-Andreae, who will advise the team on issues related to design and will use his skills to develop life-size physical models of the nanoscopic structures the scientists are seeking to build. [emphasis mine]

I wasn’t expecting to see a sculptor included in the team and I wonder if there might be plans to use his sculptures not only as models but also in exhibitions and art shows to fulfill any science outreach requirements that the NSF might have for its grantees.

I did a little further digging into the NSF’s ‘origami’ program and found this webpage explaining that ‘origami’ is part of a still larger program,

The Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation (EFRI) office awarded 15 grants in FY 2012, including the following 8 on the topic of Origami Design for Integration of Self-assembling Systems for Engineering Innovation (ODISSEI): …

As there wasn’t any information about grants for FY 2013, I gather they haven’t had time to update the page or add any recent news releases to the website.

Funding for graphene-based wireless sensor and artificial pancreas project announced

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The project to create a graphene-based wireless sensor for an artificial panceres is one of tour Minnesota-based (US) projects to get funding, from the Aug. 13, 2013 news item on Nanwoerk (Note: A link has been removed),

The Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology and Medical Genomics announced four research projects selected for funding from the 2013 Discovery Transformation Grant Program. Together, the selected researchers were awarded a total of $2 million to support their work in diabetes research. Minnesota Partnership funding comes from money appropriated by the Minnesota Legislature.

An Aug. 12, 2013 Mayo Clinic news release provides details about the four funded projects with the second one being of most interest for those following the graphene story,

Insulin Gene Therapy for Diabetes: Insulin gene therapy is a conceptually simple and feasible approach to diabetes management that, if successful, could replace long-acting insulin injections both in Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes. The investigators have created gene therapy vectors coding for insulin and a stop signal that can be activated by giving a drug, so production can be controlled. Based upon encouraging preclinical results, the current project is designed to rapidly advance the new vector to clinical testing in insulin-dependent patients with Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes.

The principal investigators of this research project are Stephen Russell, M.D.,Ph.D., professor in the Department of Molecular Medicine at Mayo Clinic and R. Scott McIvor, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development at the University of Minnesota.

A Revolutionary Sensor Platform for Realizing the Artificial Pancreas: New technologies are making it possible to develop a system to automate insulin delivery by continually monitoring blood glucose. The investigators aim to develop a graphene-based wireless sensor that can be placed in blood vessels for accurate and continual monitoring of blood glucose levels. This level of data is key to achieving optimal glucose control with an artificial pancreas.

The principal investigators are Yogish Kudva, M.D. , professor in the Department of Endocrinology at Mayo Clinic and Steven Koester, Ph.D. , professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Minnesota.

SERCA Activators for Advanced Diabetes Therapy: This project seeks a major advance in treatment for Type 2 diabetes, based on development of drugs that regulate movement of calcium within cells by targeting a naturally occurring pump abbreviated as SERCA. The investigators have already discovered several promising drug candidates that activate SERCA and alleviate mitochondrial dysfunction related to diabetes. The researchers will use high-throughput drug screening technology to find new drug candidates, and then chemically optimize their medicinal properties, paving the way for safety testing and clinical trials.

The principal investigators are David Thomas, Ph.D. and David Bernlohr, Ph.D., who are both professors in the Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Biophysics at the University of Minnesota.

A Novel Method for Detecting and Targeting Diabetes Specific CD4+ T Cells: Type 1 diabetes is a chronic T cell-mediated autoimmune disease that results in the destruction of the insulin secreting beta cells. Advances in biomarker technology have allowed the investigator and his team to identify, track and study individual CD4+ T lymphocytes present in Type 1 diabetes. In this study, the investigator will evaluate the potential of novel biomarkers to permit diagnosis of Type 1 diabetes before irreparable destruction of beta cell mass has occurred and to track auto-reactive cells during ongoing disease.

The principal investigator is Brian Fife, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Minnesota.

You can find out more about the Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology and Medical Genomics here.

SERCA Activators for Advanced Diabetes Therapy

23 new molecules discovered in red wine by Canadian and Australian scientists

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Downloaded from http://agorakitchenwpb.com/?page_id=5527 (Agora Restaurant, West Palm Beach, Florida)

Downloaded from http://agorakitchenwpb.com/?page_id=5527 (Agora Restaurant, West Palm Beach, Florida)

I would have thought that by this time scientists would have discovered all the types of molecules in red wine but it turns out that chemists at the University of British Columbia (UBC, Okanagan Campus) and at Australia’s University of Adelaide have recently discovered not one, not two, but 23 new molecules. From the Aug. 12, 2013 UBC news release,

Scientists have long espoused the health benefits of red wine. Now UBC chemists have discovered 23 new molecules that could mean there are even more vino virtues.

Assoc. Prof. Cédric Saucier, who runs the Enology laboratory at UBC’s Okanagan campus, has spent years trying to determine what is really going on in that glass of red wine. The latest discovery – in partnership with researchers from Australia’s University of Adelaide and UBC graduate student Ryan Moss – stems from a “fishing” expedition to provide a more complete profile of the molecules already known to be in red wine.

While the team of scientists knew they would find molecules called stilbenoids, the kind which are believed to have health benefits, what they found surprised them – 41 stilbenoid compounds, 23 of which have never before been detected in red wine.

I wish there was a little more detail about how these new molecules were found (did they use more powerful microscopy techniques? is there a new technique for separating the compounds) but this is all the information that”s offered (from the news release),

“The first thing we did was concentrate the wine extract,” says Moss, who is completing his master’s degree in chemistry. “We actually separated the compounds so we could examine each molecule individually and create a fingerprint of each molecule.”

Saucier says the discovery could lead to medical breakthroughs and perhaps more conclusive benefits of drinking wine in moderation. These 23 newly discovered molecules are related to resveratrol, a natural wine chemical found in the skin of red grapes known to have potential effects of preventing aging-related human diseases.

“These new molecules are likely to have very interesting biological properties and may contribute to the benefits from drinking red wine,” says Saucier. “Who knows where this could lead? Perhaps new drugs and medicine for the future?”

Saucier says each of the new stilbenoids must now be analyzed and assessed. This is only the beginning and the new molecules will lead to many more years of research, he adds.

Here’s a citation and a link to the researchers’ published study,

Investigation of monomeric and oligomeric wine stilbenoids in red wines by ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography/electrospray ionization quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry by Ryan Moss, Qinyong Mao, Dennis Taylor, and Cédric Saucier.  DOI: 10.1002/rcm.6636 Article first published online: 9 JUL 2013 Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry Volume 27, Issue 16, pages 1815–1827, 30 August 2013

This study is behind a paywall.

À votre santé!

Bioprospecting yields sunscreen ingredient fromTrondheim Fjord microorganism

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Norwegian business, Promar, has taken out patents based on research showing that a bacterium living in the Trondheim Flord has a trait much prized by makers of sunscreens, from an Aug. 6, 2013 news item on ScienceDaily,

Norwegian researchers have recently discovered a microorganism with very special properties — a bacteria living in Trondheim Fjord with the Latin name Micrococcus luteus. It possesses a trait which is rare and highly sought-after by medical science and the cosmetics industry — a pigment which can absorb long-wavelength UV radiation (in the range 350-475 nanometres).

The researchers are from SINTEF (Norwegian: Stiftelsen for industriell og teknisk forskning), which bills itself as the largest independent research organization in Scandinavia. Their July 25, 2013 news release by Christina Benjaminsen, which originated the news item, explains why this discovery is causing some excitement,

Long-wavelength UV radiation is linked to many forms of skin cancer and malignant melanomas. Currently, there are no sunscreens on the market able to filter out this type of radiation.

However, the Norwegian company Promar AS has taken out patents for both the manufacture and use in future sunscreens of a light-filtering substance extracted from this bacterium. This has been achieved with the help of researchers at SINTEF.

Researchers at SINTEF have what amounts to a library of microorganisms after years of bioprospecting (exploring for organisms with traits useful in industrial applications), from the SINTEF nrews release,

The backdrop to this project involved activities taking place at SINTEF and NTNU [Norwegian University of Science and Technology] by which we collected a variety of different microorganisms from the water surface in Trondheim Fjord. These organisms had one thing in common. They possessed a variety of naturally-occurring light-absorbing pigments. “This is why they are very colourful”, says Trygve Brautaset, Project and Research Manager at SINTEF. The end result was an entire “library” of such microorganisms.

At about the same time, the Norwegian company Promar AS had been working on the idea of manufacturing a substance with a property lacking in sunscreen products currently on the market – the ability to filter out long-wavelength UV radiation.

This is why SINTEF and NTNU were contracted to look for a pigment with this trait. After investigating hundreds of different bacteria, the researchers found Mirococcus luteus in “the library”. It ticked all the boxes. The microscopic organism, no bigger than 1-2 micrometres across, was found to contain a particular carotenoid, known to organic chemists as sarcinaxanthin. This pigment absorbs sunlight at just the wavelength which Promar wanted to provide protection against. By adding sarcinaxanthin to sunscreen, harmful solar radiation is absorbed by the cream before it reaches the skin. However, commercial production of the carotenoid required some tricky genetic engineering.

The process of isolating the particular pigment took two years, from the SINTEF news release,

Firstly, the pigments produced by the bacteria had to be characterized using a variety of chemical techniques designed to identify the desired sarcinaxanthin carotenoid. Subsequently, the genes used by the bacterium to synthesise sarcinaxanthin had to be isolated. Finally, the research team had to transfer all the genes into a host bacterium. The aim was to create an artificial bacterium able to produce sarcinaxanthin sufficiently effectively to be of commercial interest.

“After about two years’ intensive work SINTEF had the first examples of this bacterium ready”, says Brautaset. “We have now synthesised a sarcinaxanthin-producing bacterium which can be cultivated.

We will now be carrying out tests to see if we can produce it in so-called fermenters (cultivation tanks) in the laboratory. This represents an excellent method for the effective production of sarcinaxanthin in volumes large enough to make industrial applications possible”, he says.

UVAblue is the commercial name that’s been given to this new synthetically derived version of sarcinaxanthi. This new substance has aroused much interest,

… “We have been in France talking to many of the world’s largest cosmetics manufacturers”, he says. “Everyone we talked to was very interested in making use of this type of sunscreen factor in their products”, says Goksøyr [Managing Director Audun Goksøyr at Promar AS].

Among the reasons for this is that the cells which generate malignant melanomas are located deep in the skin. It is primarily long-wavelength UV radiation which penetrates to these cells when we sunbathe. By preventing this radiation from penetrating the skin will be an excellent way of averting the development of this highly lethal form of cancer. It will also act as an anti-wrinkle agent.

You can find out more about UVAblue at its eponymous website. ETA Aug. 13, 2013 1230 pm PDT: I’ve removed a citation for and a link to a paper that was incorrectly placed here.

France commits to a EUR 3.5 billion public-private partnership for Nano 2017 R&D initiative

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An Aug. 8, 2013 article by Emma Stoye for the Royal Scoiety’s (UK) Chemistry World online magazine mentions France’s investment in a public private partnership called Nano 2017 (Note: A link has been removed),

French prime minister Jean-Marc Ayrault has announced plans to invest €600 million (£516 million) in a five year nanotechnology R&D programme led by French-Italian semiconductor manufacturer STMicroelectronics (ST).

The Nano2017 programme follows on from Nano2012, a similar public-private initiative launched by Jacques Chirac in 2007.

An Aug. 2, 2013 news item on the Nanotechnology Industries Association website provides more details,

On July 22 [2013] the French government unveiled in Grenoble a new research and development programme entitled ‘Nano 2017’. It succeeds to the 2009 programme, ‘Nano 2012’, which was worth EUR 2.3 billion.

In Grenoble, the French Prime Minister visited the micro and nanotechnologies campus, Minatec and STMicroelectronics’ Crolles site. Together with the minister for Higher Education and Research, the minister for Small and Medium Enterprises, Innovation, and the Digital Economy, and the minister for Industrial Renewal, he launched ‘Nano 2017’, a EUR 3.5 billion public-private partnership specifically dedicated to nanotechnologies for superconductors.

Céline Aubert’s July 23, 2013 French language article for France 3 Alpes provides some insight into the political situation,

En visite à Crolles lundi 22 juillet, le premier ministre Jean-Marc Ayrault a dévoilé le nouveau programme de Recherche & Développement des nanotechnologies. “Nano 2017”. Plus de 3 milliards d’euros devraient être engagés.

Pas un, ni deux… mais quatre ministres pour lancer “Nano 2017”. Le chef du gouvernement, Jean-Marc Ayrault, le ministre du Redressement productif Arnaud Montebourg, Fleur Pellerin la ministre déléguée chargée des Petites et Moyennes Entreprises, de l’Innovation et de l’Economie numérique. Et enfin, Geneviève Fioraso, ministre de l’Enseignement Supérieur et de la Recherche.

On dit que François Hollande a demandé à ses ministres de ne pas prendre de vacances cet été. En voilà la preuve.

I particularly like that 2nd paragraph, “Not one, not two…but four ministers to announce “Nano 2017” followed by the last line I’ve excerpted stating government ministers are not taking holidays this summer with this turnout being proof.

For some more specifics on the dollars and the various agencies involved, there’s the July 23, 2013 news item on telecompaper,

The state [France] plans to invest EUR 600 million in the programme which falls under the European Commission’s ‘Airbus of Chips’ EUR 10 billion, 7-year initiative to double the region’s production of lower-cost, smarter chips. ST, Grenoble’s Leti institute and IBM will collaborate on nanotech research. ST will invest EUR 1.3 billion to double the capacity of its fab in Crolles to 7,000 silicon wafers a week.

The first phase Nano 2012 created 100 jobs, in this next phase, Nano 2017, authorities have promised 600 jobs will be created.

The space-time continuum as a table

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Table: The Fourth Dimension from the Potential for Collapse collection by Axel Yberg (downloaded from http://www.akkefunctionalart.com/potentialforcollapse/fourthdimension_2.html)

Table: The Fourth Dimension from the Potential for Collapse collection by Axel Yberg (downloaded from http://www.akkefunctionalart.com/potentialforcollapse/fourthdimension_2.html)

Thanks to Mark Wilson and his Aug. 6, 2013 article for Fast Company for information about this extraordinary science-themed table,

The first three dimensions of Einstein’s space-time continuum are easy–X, Y, and Z vectors give our world a shape. The fourth dimension is time, but it’s a bit more complicated than just looking at a clock because it’s actually all times happening at once. “The separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one,” Einstein once said. That’s a nice soundbite, but how do you wrap your brain around it?[emphasis mine]

…

Yberg’s answer to that question is a table. From the Fourth Dimension webpage on the akke functional art (Yberg’s company) website,

The steel-mesh embedded glass top of this piece represents the space-time continuum and the supporting pipes represent four-vectors. This theory, first proposed by Albert Einstein, states that time — the fourth dimension — is only a direction in space and that “the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one.” It’s a challenging concept because we are only able to perceive one path that time takes: the ever-changing present.

I began to think about Einstein’s theory, and how it relates to our life experiences and the time that we have for them, when talking to my brother-in-law, Chris.  He and his wife, Jill, had recently undergone two of the most emotional events that we experience as humans: the birth of a child, and the death of a loved one — their incredible dog, Hazel.  As they joyously welcomed a new member to their family, they grieved for the loss of another. The concept of time — and the importance of cherishing the present — became especially poignant.  I built The Fourth Dimension as a gift for their family, celebrating the new and honoring the old.

The four legs of the table represent the four members of their family and the cables represent how they are all connected to one another. Bound together as a family, they rely on each other for support. If any of the cables were severed, the table would collapse.

There’s also a video that features glimpses of the table as Yberg markets his company and its products,

According the akke website, the Fourth Dimension table became available in January 2012.