Atoms are the building blocks of all matter on Earth, and the patterns in which they are arranged dictate how strong, conductive or flexible a material will be. Now, scientists have used a powerful microscope to image the 3-dimensional positions of individual atoms to a precision of 19 trillionths of a meter, which is several times smaller than a hydrogen atom.

Researchers have demonstrated working electronic circuits that have been produced in a radically new way, using methods that resemble Darwinian evolution. The size of these circuits is comparable to the size of their conventional counterparts, but they are much closer to natural networks like the human brain. The findings promise a new generation of powerful, energy-efficient electronics.

Single atoms or molecules imprisoned by laser light in a doughnut-shaped metal cage could unlock the key to advanced storage devices, computers and high-resolution instruments.

In a discovery that could open new pathways to find new materials for nanotechnology devices, physicists have found ferroelectricity could be induced in a thin sheet of strontium titanate. The material ordinarily is not ferroelectric. The finding contradicts conventional wisdom that materials lose ferroelectricity as they are made thinner.

Researchers have devised an ultra-thin invisibility ‘skin’ cloak that can conform to the shape of an object and conceal it from detection with visible light. Although this cloak is only microscopic in size, the principles behind the technology should enable it to be scaled-up to conceal macroscopic items as well.

A new lab-on-a-chip cell sorting device based on acoustic waves has been developed by researchers. In a new article, investigators describe an acoustic cell sorter capable of the kind of high sorting throughput necessary to compete with commercial fluorescence activated cell sorters.

Nanoparticles disguised as human platelets could greatly enhance the healing power of drug treatments for cardiovascular disease and systemic bacterial infections. These nanoparticles are capable of delivering drugs to targeted sites in the body — particularly injured blood vessels and organs infected by harmful bacteria. This targeted drug delivery greatly increased the therapeutic effects of drugs administered to diseased rats and mice.

Detecting breast cancer in women with dense mammary tissues could become more reliable with a new mammogram procedure that researchers have now tested in pre-clinical studies of mice. Scientists describe injecting gold nanoparticles in mammary tissue to enhance the imaging of early signs of breast cancer.

Antigen receptors on B lymphocytes sense foreign molecules and activate the B cells to produce antibodies that protect humans against many diseases. Researchers have applied super-resolution methods to study the distribution of the two major classes of antigen receptors on mature B lymphocytes: IgM and IgD. They found out that IgM and IgD receptors are organized in protein islands.

Scientists have now called into question the results of a study published in Physical Review Letters. In the original study, the British scientists claimed that they managed to find the missing link in the electromagnetic theory. The findings, according to the scientists, could help decrease the size of antennas in electronic devices, promising a major breakthrough in the field of wireless communications.