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Two New Discoveries With Atoms Pave Way For Invention

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This article is more than 9 years old.

Science never stops pushing boundaries to take us to the next level of discovery. Within a seven day window, researchers and physicists in both the United States and Europe made two different discoveries pertaining to atoms - the basic building blocks of matter.

Physicists from University of Basel in Switzerland took a step towards the next generation of atomic-scale storage devices by putting 20 single bromine atoms on an insulated surface at room temperature. In a symbolic move, the physicists arranged the atoms in a  Swiss Cross that measured  5.6 nanometers. It's the first and largest number of atomic manipulations created at room temperature and researchers believe the discovery will lead to a new electromechanical systems and logic circuits.

Seven days later, researchers at Rice University's Lab for Nanophotonics (LANP) say they created a new sensor to amplify the optical signature of molecules 100 billion times and correctly identify the composition of molecules with less than 20 atoms.

The new molecule-sensor has the potential to be easily commercialized and has the potential to be used in environments requiring sensitive chemical-composition analysis from environmental pollutant analysis to detection of low concentrate abused drugs in saliva.