Nanotube Motor Powered by Electron Wind

July 14, 2008

You have to be really small to feel this breeze in your face, but the innovation is cool nonetheless.

Steven Bailey and colleagues from Lancaster University have created both a nanomotor (a) and a nanodrill (b) that could work as tiny motors in nanosized machines. Both rely on electrons, which travel between the two ends points -- either gold to gold or gold to mercury.

The electrons move when a voltage is applied and create a wind that is capable of spinning the rotor
up to 8,000 meters per second.

The nanomotor could be used as a switch in nanoscale magnetic memory devices; the nanodrill could work as a pump in a tiny device filled with fluid.

The team describe their work in the journal Physical Review Letters.