The Molecular NanoTweezer: Nanomanipulation taken to new lows

摘要

By exploiting near field optical forces, the Molecular NanoTweezer can trap the smallest nanoparticles yet reported including individual proteins and quantum dots. This breakthrough is being commercialized and will produce the first system to allow direct optical manipulation of biological nanoparticles. The Molecular NanoTweezer overcomes the lower size limit imposed by diffraction (the limit of traditional optical tweezers) by using waveguides and optical resonators patterned on silicon chips that produce near field optical forces. In this talk, we will discuss current and future applications of this technology, including surface-tether-free immunoassays. We will finalize our talk by briefly overviewing the commercialization efforts