Nanocrystal morphs out of tight spots

• Autores: Lisa Grossman
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 2916, 2013, pág. 14
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Sinisa Coh of the University of California, Berkeley, and colleagues saw something surprising when they used a high-resolution electron microscope to watch an iron crystal moving through a kinked nanotube. The solid crystal squeezed right through, even though it shouldn't have been able to fit. Using computer simulations, Coh figured out that the crystal was disassembling and re- assembling itself to get through the narrower gap. If the crystal was moving from left to right, some of the leftmost atoms on its surface would detach and leapfrog over the rest of the crystal, settling on its right side. Atoms that had previously been inside the crystal were now on the surface, where they repeated the process.