Golden scales: Nanoscale mass sensor from Berkeley can be used to weigh individual atoms and molecules

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A double-walled carbon nanotube NEMS has been used to measure the mass of a single atom of gold. Atoms landing on the tube change the tubes resonant frequency in proportion to the mass of the atoms much like what happens when a diver hits a springboa ...
A double-walled carbon nanotube NEMS has been used to measure the mass of a single atom of gold. Atoms landing on the tube change the tube's resonant frequency in proportion to the mass of the atoms, much like what happens when a diver hits a springboard. Image by Kenneth Jensen
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(PhysOrg.com) -- There's a new "gold standard" in the sensitivity of weighing scales. Using the same technology with which they created the world's first fully functional nanotube radio, researchers with Berkeley Lab and the University of California at Berkeley have fashioned a nanoelectromechanical system (NEMS) that can function as a scale sensitive enough to measure the mass of a single atom of gold.


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