Small optical force can budge nanoscale objects

November 16, 2009
With a bit of leverage, Cornell researchers have used a very tiny beam of light with as little as 1 milliwatt of power to move a silicon structure up to 12 nanometers. That's enough to completely switch the optical properties of the structure from opaque to transparent, they reported.

Researcher works toward making biological imaging 1,000 times faster with stimulus grant

November 16, 2009
Fluorescence lifetime imaging is a useful but relatively complex technique for probing the local microenvironment of a fluorescent molecule. The method can be used to help determine biochemical makeup of body tissues or measure distances between molecules on the nanometer scale. With a new grant of more than $675,000 from the National Science Foundation funded by the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA), Warren Zipfel '87, Ph.D. '93, associate professor of biomedical engineering, is working to make fluorescence lifetime imaging more efficient and simpler to implement.

Researchers find reliable, mess-free way to grow graphene

November 9, 2009
Single layers of carbon atoms, called graphene sheets, are lightweight, strong, electrically semi-conducting -- and notoriously difficult and expensive to make.

'Temporal telescope' compresses optical signals

November 3, 2009
Cornell researchers have developed an ingenious method to time-compress optical signals. The process could enable optical communication systems to carry many more bits per second or could also be used to generate short bursts of light with complex waveforms needed to control chemistry and physics experiments where changes are induced by light.

Stimulus funds to pay for equipment at nanoscale facility

October 27, 2009
The Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility (CNF) has received $1.38 million in federal stimulus funds to help with equipment upgrades. CNF is one of 14 members of the National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN) of user facilities for nanofabrication. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) has allocated $10 million to NNIN to spread over the 14 sites for various needs. CNF's portion is an add-on to its regular National Science Foundation grant of $2.68 million per year.

Battling cancer with engineering: National Cancer Institute funds Cornell-led $13 million research center

October 27, 2009
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has funded the new Center on the Microenvironment and Metastasis, which will be headquartered at Cornell. The center will focus on using nanobiotechnology and other related physical science approaches to advance research on cancer.

Harold Craighead wins research honor from UPenn

October 21, 2009
The University of Pennsylvania's Nano/BioInterface Center has presented its annual Award for Research Excellence in Nanotechnology to Harold Craighead, Cornell's C.W. Lake Professor of Engineering.

Student inventions -- artificial tissue networks and a skull base sealer -- honored in competition

October 21, 2009
Using a cotton candy machine to make artificial tissues with an embedded vascular system and a skull base sealer to help surgeons repair holes in the base of the skull after surgery are two student-developed inventions that were awarded finalist status in the 2009 Collegiate Inventors Competition.

Piezoresistive transduction in multilayer polycrystalline silicon resonators

October 1, 2009
A new paper has been published by J. D. Cross et al. in the journal Applied Physics Letters. These resonators, fabricated from highly doped polycrystalline silicon layers separated by a dielectric layer, effectively transduces their mechanical motion as a vertical piezoresistor.

'Time telescope' could boost web

September 30, 2009
Researchers have demonstrated a "time telescope" that could squeeze much more information into the data packets sent around the internet.

Researchers receive prestigious NIH grants

September 24, 2009
The Transformative R01 grants are awarded for "exceptionally innovative, high-risk and unconventional research projects that have the potential to create or overturn fundamental paradigms." The amounts of these five-year awards will be announced at a later date. Lis and Jin, in molecular biology and genetics, and Craighead, in applied and engineering physics, will use their grant to develop protein-capture reagents that can specifically or selectively recognize, bind and "capture" a broad spectrum of human proteins that may then be adapted for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes.

A method for nanofluidic device prototyping using elastomeric collapse

September 15, 2009
A new paper has been published by S.-M. Park et al. in the journal PNAS, demonstrating a technique for nanofluidic fabrication based on the controlled collapse of microchannel structures.

Stimulus funds help synchrotron research, Energy Recovery Linac stay the course

September 14, 2009
The National Science Foundation is continuing its support of Cornell's world-renowned synchrotron X-ray research facility, thanks in part to federal stimulus funding. Nearly $19 million allocated this year through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) will support research at Wilson Synchrotron Laboratory, including the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS), the Cornell Electron Storage Ring (CESR) and ongoing efforts to plan and build a new linear accelerator called the Energy Recovery Linac.

Carbon nanotubes could make efficient solar cells

September 10, 2009
Using a carbon nanotube instead of traditional silicon, Cornell researchers have created the basic elements of a solar cell that hopefully will lead to much more efficient ways of converting light to electricity than now used in calculators and on rooftops.

As Jefferson fellow, Paul Kintner to spend the year at the State Department

September 9, 2009
Paul Kintner, professor of electrical and computer engineering, will advise the U.S. government on global positioning systems (GPS), space weather, navigation satellite systems and other defense-related topics this year as a U.S. Department of State Jefferson Science Fellow.

U.S. News & World Report ranks five CU programs in top 10

September 4, 2009
In its 2010 rankings, U.S. News and World Report ranks Cornell second in the category for undergraduate engineering science/engineering physics programs at doctorate-granting schools.

Labeling and purification of cellulose-binding proteins for high resolution fluorescence applications

September 3, 2009
A new paper has been published by Jose M. Moran-Mirabal et al. in the journal Analytical Chemistry, demonstrating a new protocol for labeling cellulases with three different fluorophores and their purification and separation of the labeled products.

Parylene peel-off arrays to probe the role of cellcell interactions in tumour angiogenesis

August 27, 2009
A new manuscript has been published by C. P. Tan et al. in the journal Integrative Biology. This work uses parylene as a stencil in order to pattern arrays of material which cells preferentially bind to. By simply varying the size and spacing of these arrays, the communication between single and groups of cells can be studied as a function of cell number and spacing, which should continue to give insights into tumor cell behavior and angiogenesis.

Synchrotron unveils long-hidden N.C. Wyeth painting

August 20, 2009
Stubborn layers of paint had kept them hidden for several decades, but the bluish, purplish and reddish hues of a 1919 painting by 20th-century artist N.C. Wyeth have finally come to light, thanks to cutting-edge technologies developed at the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS).

Detection of prostate specific antigen with nanomechanical resonators

August 18, 2009
A new paper has been published by P. S. Waggoner et al. in the journal Lab on a Chip, demonstrating the detection of prostate specific antigen, a biomarker used for prostate cancer detection. The molecule could be detected at concentrations as low as 50 fg/mL (1.5 fM) in undiluted serum.

Prion Protein detection in serum using micromechanical resonator arrays

August 15, 2009
A new paper has been published by Madhukar Varshney et al. in the journal Talanta, demonstrating the detection of Prion proteins in serum using secondary mass labeling.

Micromechanical drumhead resonators for pressure sensing

June 22, 2009
A new paper has been published from D.R. Southworth et al. entitled, "Pressure dependent resonant frequency of micromechanical drumhead resonators," in Applied Physics Letters. These devices were found to be excellent pressure sensors, giving a linear response in frequency shift from pressures of roughly one hundredth of an atmosphere up to nearly 4 atmospheres.

New paper published on high-Q, in-plane resonators operated in air

May 19, 2009
Recent results showing that side-to-side vibration of nanomechanical resonators feature high quality factors at atmospheric pressures have been published by P. S. Waggoner et al. in the Journal of Applied Physics, DOI:10.1063/1.3123767. These trampoline-shaped devices are promising for sensor applications at high/atmospheric pressures, and suggest that this in-plane resonant mode can be beneficial for other resonator designs as well.

Cornell team shares in grant to see how graphene can replace silicon in microchips

May 19, 2009
Silicon has been the main ingredient in microchips since they replaced vacuum tubes in electronics. But the common element graphene, found in pencils, may one day supplant silicon on the billion-dollar foundries of IBM, Intel and AMD.

DNA molecules engineered to detect pathogens

May 19, 2009
First, Cornell researchers created DNA "bar codes" -- strands of the genetic material that quickly identify the presence of different molecules by fluorescing. Now, they have created new DNA molecules that can detect pathogens and deliver drugs to cells when they form long chains called polymers.

Metal sheets with DNA framework could enable future nanocircuits

May 19, 2009
Using DNA not as a genetic material but as a structural support, Cornell researchers have created thin sheets of gold nanoparticles held together by strands of DNA. The work could prove useful for making thin transistors or other electronic devices.

CU, Ireland nanoscientists to co-host workshop in Dublin

May 18, 2009
Cornell's Nanobiotechnology Center (NBTC) and colleagues in Ireland are co-hosting an International Workshop on Nanotechnology Enabled Sensors and Diagnostics, June 4-5 at Dublin City University, Ireland.

Recent research selected for inclusion in the Virtual Journal of Nanoscale Science and Technology

May 15, 2009
A paper recently published by P. S. Waggoner et al., High-Q, in-plane modes of nanomechanical resonators operated in air, has been chosen for virtual publication in the May 18th issue of the Virtual Journal of Nanoscale Science and Technology, published by the AIP and APS in cooperation with others to compile outstanding research in this field across many journals.

The Harry Potter effect: Cornell researchers experiment with making objects 'invisible'

May 12, 2009
Somewhat the way Harry Potter can cover himself with a cloak and become invisible, Cornell researchers have developed a device that can make it seem that a bump in a carpet -- or, indeed, any flat surface -- isn't there.

Small Times again ranks Cornell among top 10 nanotechnology institutions

May 11, 2009
Small Times magazine's annual rankings of institutions for nanotechnology research and innovation have once again placed Cornell in the top 10 of each of six categories.

Stimulus money will fuel energy research and add jobs

May 7, 2009
Cornell researchers have won federal stimulus funding for three projects that will help meet the nation's future energy needs, with additional state support for one project. The proposals are the first to be approved among dozens submitted by the university for the federal aid. Hector Abruna Abruña The funding is expected to support at least 30 new graduate students and postdoctoral researchers, and ...

Lois Pollack seeks answers to questions at the forefront of molecular biology

May 1, 2009
Lois Pollack loves to build tools. One of her favorites is a paper-thin purple square of silicon, less than an inch across, with channels thinner than a human hair. "This is one of the earlier mixers I built," says the associate professor of applied and engineering physics. Looking at it, its hard to believe that this "mixer"two microscopic channels etched cross-waysin the late 1990s became a new window on how proteins danced their tangled dance during the first few moments of folding.

Recent aptamer publication featured as "Hot Article" by RSC

April 28, 2009
A recently published paper from S.-M. Park et al. in Lab on a Chip DOI:10.1039/b819905a has been featured on the Royal Society of Chemistry website as a "Hot Article." This work describes a microfluidic device used to select and purify aptamers using individually addressable sol-gel capture droplets which can capture specific aptamers but later be removed with integrated heaters. This chip-based method shows promising results for improving the way aptamers are developed and prepared.

Putting the squeeze on an old material could lead to 'instant on' electronic memory

April 16, 2009
The technology of storing electronic information -- from old cassette tapes to shiny laptop computers -- has been a major force in the electronics industry for decades. Low-power, high-efficiency electronic memory could be the long-term result of collaborative research led by Cornell materials scientist Darrell Schlom. The research, to be published April 17 in the journal Science (Vol. 324 No. 5925), involves taking a well-known oxide, strontium titanate, and depositing it on silicon in such a way that the silicon squeezes it into a special state called ferroelectric -- a result that could prove key to next-generation memory devices.

Sugar-based microfluidics paper featured on cover of Soft Matter

April 7, 2009
A recently published paper from Leon Bellan et al. using cotton candy to form dense microfluidic channels for artificial tissue in Soft Matter DOI:10.1039/b819905a has been featured on the front cover of issue 7 (Vol. 5, 2009).

Funding renewed for national nanotechnology network

March 9, 2009
A high-profile consortium of nanotechnology research centers, of which Cornell is the lead institution and a founding member, has received a five-year renewal grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) in the amount of $17 million per year. With the renewal -- a 20 percent increase over the previous grant -- the National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN) entered its second five-year term on March 1. Led by Sandip Tiwari, Cornell's Charles Mellowes Professor in Engineering, NNIN provides researchers with cutting-edge facilities and support in nanoscale fabrication, synthesis, characterization, modeling, design, computation and training.

Relationship Between the Design and Sensitivity of Resonant Sensors

March 9, 2009
A new paper has been published by Philip S. Waggoner and Harold G. Craighead in the Journal of Applied Physics, DOI:10.1063/1.3079793, looking into how resonator design affects the detection mechanism and sensitivity of the sensor. Notably, traditional cantilever devices were shown to not always be the most sensitive, and it was suggested that in most resonant biosensing applications, only the bound mass would be detected rather than stiffness. Update: This paper has been selected for inclusion in the 23 Mar 2009 issue of the Virtual Journal of Nanoscale Science & Technology.

Cotton Candy Can Help Labs Grow Tissue, featured in Discovery News

February 25, 2009
In an effort to improve the relatively thick artificial tissue implants, a cotton candy based approach has been developed to form a widespread and interconnected network of microfluidic channels. This research was published by Leon M. Bellan et al. in the journal Soft Matter DOI:10.1039/b819905a This work was also highlighted in a video feature on the Discovery Channel program Daily Planet.

Nanotech facility receives five-year renewal grant from NSF

January 20, 2009
Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility (CNF) has received another five years of funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF). The facility, which is the flagship of Cornell's cutting-edge nanotechnology research, is one of 14 such research facilities across the country that make up the National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN). CNF is set to receive $2.68 million per year for the next five years, said George Malliaras, the Lester B. Knight Director of CNF. The NNIN receives $17 million per year of federal funds.

Carbon nanotube 'ink' may lead to thinner, lighter transistors and solar cells

January 8, 2009
Using a simple chemical process, scientists at Cornell and DuPont have invented a method of preparing carbon nanotubes for suspension in a semiconducting "ink," which can then be printed into such thin, flexible electronics as transistors and photovoltaic materials.

Using light to move and trap DNA molecules

December 31, 2008
A major goal of nanotechnology research is to create a "lab on a chip," in which a tiny biological sample would be carried through microscopic channels for processing. This could make possible portable, fast-acting detectors for disease organisms or food-borne pathogens, rapid DNA sequencing and other tests that now take hours or days.

Researchers show how to measure conductance of carbon nanotubes, one by one

December 15, 2008
A single batch of carbon nanotubes -- molecular carbon cylinders that may one day revolutionize electronics engineering -- often includes more than 100 types of tubes, each with different optical and electrical properties. Individual electrical measurements of the molecules typically require such slow and expensive methods as electron-beam lithography.

Researchers develop ultrafast oscilloscope on a chip

November 5, 2008
As photonics -- using beams of light in place of electricity for communications and computing -- becomes more common, engineers need new tools for troubleshooting. Now researchers at Cornell have created a way to plot the waveform of an ultrashort-lived optical signal with a resolution of less than a trillionth of a second.

For the fourth year in a row, Cornell's applied and engineering physics program has been ranked No. 1 among its peers

August 22, 2008
For the fourth year in a row, Cornell's applied and engineering physics program has been ranked No. 1 among its peers, according to U.S. News and World Report's 2009 college rankings, released online today (Aug. 22). The undergraduate engineering program as a whole was ranked eighth in the nation.

Watt W. Webb 80th Birthday Symposium

June 20, 2008
Biophysicist Watt Webb enters ninth decade, and his colleagues pay tribute

How a Cornell team's study of horses is providing insights into a predicted human flu pandemic

April 22, 2008
Stored safely in a freezer at Cornell's James A. Baker Institute for Animal Health are samples of the virus thought to be most like the one public health experts expect someday to afflict record numbers of the world's population. The virus was collected in 1973 during an outbreak of equine influenza at a Florida racetrack. Dorothy Holmes, an infectious disease specialist in Cornell's College of Veterinary Medicine, had obtained samples of the virus with the intention of using it to create nasal spray vaccines for horses. Now, 35 years later, Cornell scientists have the rare chance to study the behavior of the organism to figure out why this particular virus, an H7 serotype, outperforms all other serotypes in its lethal powers. The study is supported by a seven-year, $3 million award from the National Institutes of Health.

McEuen and Ralph put new spin on quantum computing in carbon nanotubes

March 26, 2008
Researchers hoping to use carbon nanotubes for quantum computing -- in which the spin of a single electron would represent a bit of data -- may have to change their approaches, according to new Cornell research.

By color-coding atoms, new Cornell electron microscope promises big advance in materials analysis

February 21, 2008
A new electron microscope recently installed in Cornell's Duffield Hall is enabling scientists for the first time to form images that uniquely identify individual atoms in a crystal and see how those atoms bond to one another. And in living color.

Nano gridiron: CU physicists create tiny trophy to be awarded on Super Bowl Sunday

January 9, 2008
While the world's biggest football game is under way, someone will be awarded the world's smallest trophy, created by Cornell nanotechnology specialists. Craighead Lab Up close the nanotrophy chip displays an image of a football field, upper left. A tiny portion of that image, viewed under an electron microscope, is another football field, and a tiny portion of that, in turn, is the smallest field of all, 2.4 millionths of an meter long, drawn in lines 59 billionths of a meter wide. Larger version The "Nano Bowl" contest, sponsored by PhysicsCentral -- an educational arm of the American Physical Society -- challenges entrants to create short videos explaining some aspect of the physics of football. The winner, to be announced on Super Bowl Sunday, Feb. 3, will receive a trophy made at the Cornell NanoScale Facility (CNF).

Research sheds light on the mechanics of gene transcription

January 8, 2008
The molecular machinery behind gene transcription -- the intricate transfer of information from a segment of DNA to a corresponding strand of messenger RNA -- isn't stationed in special "transcription factories" within a cell nucleus, according to Cornell researchers. Instead, the enzyme RNA polymerase II (Pol II) and other key molecules can assemble at the site of an activated gene, regardless of the gene's position.

Ithaca-Weill collaborations spur videoconferencing upgrades

October 12, 2007
Students in Biophysical Methods (A&EP 570) are taught by Manfred Lindau, professor of applied and engineering physics, and Fred Maxfield, professor and chair of the Department of Biochemistry at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City. Maxfield doesn't commute. He lectures from New York City, appearing larger than life on a screen in 162 Hollister Hall.

CU researchers shed light on light-emitting nanodevice

October 3, 2007
An interdisciplinary team of Cornell nanotechnology researchers has unraveled some of the fundamental physics of a material that holds promise for light-emitting, flexible semiconductors. Provided Top view of the ruthenium tris-bipyridine light-emitting device created by Cornell researchers. The ruthenium metal complex is represented by red spheres, and counter ions are represented by green spheres. The material is sandwiched between two gold electrodes. Also visible is the probe of the electron force microscope used to measure the electric field of the device. The discovery, which involved years of perfecting a technique for building a specific type of light-emitting device, is reported in the Sept. 30 online publication of the journal Nature Materials.

Coming in 2010: New space for research, serendipity and intellectual collisions

September 24, 2007
The fences are up; orange-vested workers are gathering. Construction of the new physical sciences building -- an enhanced research and teaching space for Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Physics, and Applied and Engineering Physics -- on East Avenue between Rockefeller Hall and Baker Lab, has begun.

Robert Buhrman named vice provost for research

August 23, 2007
Robert Buhrman, director of Cornell's Center for Nanoscale Systems (CNS), has been named vice provost for research. He succeeds Nobel laureate Robert Richardson, who will become senior science adviser to Provost Carolyn (Biddy) Martin and President David Skorton.

Researchers discover 'exotic' interface between two materials

August 20, 2007
In another step toward understanding matter at its most fundamental levels, Cornell researchers have found that two rather conventional materials can be made to exhibit very unconventional properties when they interface. David A. Muller, Cornell professor of applied and engineering physics, and graduate student Lena Fitting Kourkoutis, along with European colleagues, created a superconducting phase at the atomic interface of two oxygen-based compounds by exposing them to the extremely cold temperature of 200 millikelvin (about minus 459 degrees Fahrenheit) -- close to absolute zero on the temperature scale. A superconductor is capable of conducting electricity with virtually no resistance.

Cornell engineering physics is ranked No. 1 for third straight year by U.S. News and World Report

August 17, 2007
For undergraduates looking for the top program in engineering physics, Cornell is the best place to go, according to U.S. News and World Report. In its annual university and college rankings issue, the magazine has given the Cornell program top billing for the third year in a row in the category Engineering Science/Engineering Physics under Specialties for Best Undergraduate Engineering Programs.

New Undergraduate Research Grant Available!

August 17, 2007

Side-to-side shaking of nanoresonators throws off impurities, researchers find

August 6, 2007
Tiny vibrating silicon resonators are of intense interest in nanotechnology circles for their potential ability to detect bacteria, viruses, DNA and other biological molecules. Cornell researchers have demonstrated a new way to make these resonators vibrate "in the plane" -- that is, side to side -- and have shown that this can serve a vital function: shaking off extraneous stuff that isn't supposed to be detected.

Cornell scientists Barbara Baird and John Silcox talk up nanotechnology on NPR's 'Science Friday'

June 18, 2007
From devices that recognize diseases before symptoms appear to sensors that detect toxins in the environment, people across the nation tuning into National Public Radio (NPR) June 15 heard from Cornell scientists about such potential breakthroughs that nanotechnology promises. Barbara Baird, Cornell professor of chemistry, and John Silcox, Cornell professor of applied and engineering physics, were among the featured guests on "Science Friday," part of NPR's "Talk of the Nation" radio program. The broadcast took place on the heels of the Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility (CNF) 30th anniversary symposium the previous day.

CNF reflects on past, looks to future of nanoscience at 30th anniversary celebration

June 18, 2007
The Cornell campus buzzed with close to 380 participants at the 30th anniversary celebration of the Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility (CNF), June 14. Topics addressed included drug delivery, ethics and even science fiction.

From bone replacements to gene delivery systems: Seed grants fund collaborative research with medical school

April 18, 2007
Harold Craighead, the C.W. Lake Jr. Professor of Engineering (Ithaca), and Douglas Scherr, assistant professor of Urology (WCMC), to develop a microfluidic system for early detection of bladder cancer.

Cornell researchers develop virus-size 'nanolamps' that could aid use of flexible electronic devices as sensors

April 11, 2007
A Cornell team of researchers has produced microscopic 'nanolamps' -- light-emitting nanofibers about the size of a virus or the tiniest of bacteria. The potential applications are in flexible electronic products, which are being made increasingly smaller.

David Muller's 'landmark' work in interfacing single layers of atoms wins Nature Materials 'Top 10' accolade

April 11, 2007
The work of Professor David Muller and colleagues in interfacing single layers of atoms has been chosen by the journal Nature Materials as one of its top 10 papers of 2006. (April 11, 2007)

Reach out and touch an oscillator: Cornell researchers find a new way to read nanoscale vibrations

March 26, 2007
Nanomechanical oscillators -- tiny strips of vibrating silicon only a few hundred atoms thick -- are the subject of extensive study by nanotechnology researchers. They could someday replace bulky quartz crystals in electronic circuits or be used to detect and identify bacteria and viruses.

Harold Craighead and Éva Tardos elected to National Academy of Engineering

February 12, 2007
Two members of Cornell's engineering faculty -- Harold Craighead, the Charles W. Lake Jr. Professor of Engineering, and Éva Tardos, professor and chair of the Department of Computer Science -- are among 64 new members and nine foreign associates elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE).

'Watching atoms move' is goal of powerful new X-ray sources, says CU's Joel Brock in Science article

February 5, 2007
When excited, atoms move at impossibly small length and time scales -- too small and too fast to have been observed in years past. But as applied and engineering physics professor Joel D. Brock comments in the Feb. 2 issue of Science, a new generation of X-ray sources is allowing scientists to watch atoms move. In his short paper, "Watching Atoms Move," Brock explains how scientists' understanding of matter is changing.

Using new ways to study a devastating disease: Researchers observe Alzheimer's disease in cultures and living tissue

January 23, 2007
Beta amyloid plaques -- the clumps of protein molecules that build up in the brains of people afflicted with Alzheimer's disease -- have long been the focus of researchers searching for ways to treat the devastating illness. At Cornell, a group of scientists on the Ithaca and New York City campuses (Watt Webb, professor of applied physics and the S.B. Eckert Professor in Engineering in Ithaca, Fred Maxfield, the Israel Rogosin Professor of Biochemistry and chair of the Department of Biochemistry at Weill Cornell Medical College (WCMC), and Gunnar Gouras, associate professor of neurology and neuroscience at WCMC are studying how the plaques' precursor molecules form, what makes them clump together and why the cells normally responsible for trash removal within the brain fail to gobble them up. The work could eventually lead to a way of stimulating brain cells to destroy the precursor molecules, the way the body's white blood cells destroy everyday debris and invaders such as viruses and harmful bacteria.

From developing artificial skin to relieving chronic pain in elderly, growing cross-campus collaborations improve quality of life

December 6, 2006
Watt Webb, Cornell professor of applied physics and the S.B. Eckert Professor in Engineering, is leading one of the largest efforts: an extensive group of collaborative projects involving multiphoton microscopy (MPM), a technique pioneered in his lab. The projects aim to combine MPM with medical endoscopies to provide images of tissue in situ and in real time, using microscopic fluorescence and harmonic excitation.

On visit to Cornell, Israeli elder statesman Peres sees technology at work and points to it as a key to peace

November 29, 2006
Israeli elder statesman and former prime minister Shimon Peres stressed the role of science, technology and innovation in a global economy as a key to peace in the Middle East in a public lecture in Bailey Hall on Nov. 28. "Science doesn't know nationalities," he commented at a press conference before his speech. As minister for the development of the Negev and Galilee regions of Israel, Peres has a keen interest in technology, water conservation and energy issues. He discussed nanotechnology briefly over lunch with Skorton, and then, during his tour of Duffield Hall, Peres learned firsthand of recent research at Cornell from Donald Tennant, director of operations at the Cornell NanoScale Facility, W. Kent Fuchs, dean of the College of Engineering, and from applied and engineering physics professors.

Cornell inventors recognized for contributions to the university and the world

November 1, 2006
Nanotech devices for biology research, a new way to pasteurize milk, improvements in cellular phone systems and new strawberry varieties were among the 41 patents issued to 32 Cornell inventors during fiscal year 2005-06. They were honored Oct. 24 in a recognition ceremony presented by the Cornell Center for Technology, Enterprise and Commercialization (CCTEC) in Statler Ballroom B.

Hot flies produce cool results -- the ability to watch genes in action in live tissue

September 18, 2006
Feverish fruit fly larvae, warmed in a toasty lab chamber, are giving Cornell researchers a way to watch chromosomes in action and actually see how genes are expressed in living tissue. Using multiphoton fluorescence microscopy, a technique pioneered at Cornell by physicist Watt W. Webb, researchers have for the first time been able to watch chromosomes change their form in order to activate their genes to synthesize key proteins in fruit fly cells. The advance could be a significant step toward understanding the basic processes that underlie gene expression.

Harold Craighead returns to directorship of Nanobiotechnolgy Center

August 30, 2006
Harold Craighead, the Charles W. Lake Jr. Professor of Engineering and professor of applied and engineering physics, has returned to the post of director of the Cornell Nanobiotechnology Center (NBTC). Craighead was the first director when the center was created in January 2000. In June 2001, he was named interim dean of the College of Engineering, and Barbara Baird, professor of chemistry and chemical biology, became director of NBTC. After W. Kent Fuchs was named dean of the College of Engineering in March 2002, Craighead became co-director of the center.

Pataki brings $12 million for new accelerator to create world's brightest X-rays

August 21, 2006
Making his second visit to the Cornell campus in a week, New York Gov. George Pataki again brought funding, this time $12 million for preliminary work on the proposed Energy Recovery Linac (ERL), which will help create the brightest source of X-rays in the world.

Recent stories about university and program rankings

August 19, 2006

Cornell again ranks first in engineering physics in U.S. News rankings, and is called top Ivy by Washington Monthly

August 18, 2006
U.S. News and World Report has placed Cornell at the top of its rankings for best undergraduate engineering science/engineering physics program for the second year in a row. In its overall rankings for Best National Universities, Cornell is tied with Washington University in St. Louis for 12th place; last year Cornell was tied for 13th with Johns Hopkins University, and was 14th the year before that.

High school students visit campus to learn how chemistry informs the humanities and social sciences

July 26, 2006
At CHESS, students first heard from Joel Brock, professor of applied and engineering physics, about particle accelerators and X-ray production, then about the wide variety of science done with X-rays. A hands-on activity with X-ray fluorescence (XRF) -- the light, or glow, given off by a specimen when it is hit by high-energy X-ray beams -- gave the students an opportunity to record spectra from such stone artifacts as flint, chert or arrowhead specimens.

Sharply tuned nanostrings work at room temperature

July 12, 2006
Using a fast, low-cost fabrication technique that allows inexpensive testing of a wide variety of materials, Cornell researchers have come up with nanoscale resonators -- tiny vibrating strings -- with the highest quality factor so far obtainable at room temperature for devices so small.

Researchers create a broadband light amplifier on a chip

July 6, 2006
Cornell researchers have created a broadband light amplifier on a silicon chip, a major breakthrough in the quest to create photonic microchips. In such microchips, beams of light traveling through microscopic waveguides will replace electric currents traveling through microscopic wires. A team of researchers working with Alexander Gaeta, Cornell professor of applied and engineering physics, and Michal Lipson, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, used the Cornell NanoScale Facility to make the devices. They reported their results in the June 22 issue of the journal Nature.

'We're down to the atom size': Cornell researchers discover how to focus on tiniest of the very small

June 14, 2006
If you need a good picture of a molecule, your first job is getting its atoms to pose for you, says John Silcox, Cornell's David E. Burr Professor of Engineering and an expert in the realm of the very tiny. But atoms are not willing subjects. They jiggle furiously, defying any microscopist who tries to catch them at a standstill. Nor are they polite: The larger atoms in a molecule typically overshadow the smaller ones, making it impossible to view the little ones.

Cornell leads universities overall in nanotechnology rankings by leading industry magazine

June 13, 2006
In a series of rankings of university nanotechnology programs by Small Times, a trade magazine devoted to nanotechnology, Cornell ranked in the top 10 in eight out of nine categories, and in the top five in six categories, leading all universities overall.

Professor Robert A. Buhrman elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

April 27, 2006
Robert A. Buhrman, the John Edson Sweet Professor of Engineering and director of Cornell's Center for Nanoscale Systems, and three other Cornell faculty members have been elected fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

David Muller selected #2 in Top 5 Hot Talks from the Fall 2005 MRS Meeting

December 15, 2005
From tissue engineering to environmental nanotechnology, the 2005 MRS Fall Meeting, held last month in Boston, brought together over 5,100 attendees from all sectors of the global materials science and engineering communities. Over 4,700 oral and poster presentations were featured (from 42 technical symposia), and of them, the following were selected as the Top 5 Hot Talks/Cool Papers of the week & for research that translates to general public interest or application. Potential hot talks/cool papers were identified by the Fall Meeting symposium organizers; the Top 5 were selected from this group by the MRS Public Outreach Committee (POC). Although not a formal competition, this service of the POC is intended to increase awareness of materials research and its importance in our everyday lives.

Guinness world record for Craighead

October 31, 2005
Harold Craighead, professor of applied and engineering physics, and research assistant Rob Ilic have their research featured in the 2006 edition of "The Guinness Book of World Records."

Silcox named interim director of NSF's Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility

September 21, 2005
While faculty and administrators at the National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility (CNF) search for a new director, John Silcox, the David E. Burr Professor of Engineering at Cornell University, will take over Oct. 1 as interim director.

Cornell ranks fourth in nation according to Washington Monthly, tops in engineering physics according to peers

August 31, 2005
The first annual college guide introduced by the magazine Washington Monthly has ranked Cornell University fourth in the nation, leaving Yale and Harvard in the dust at 15th and 16th. At the same time, in its 2005 ranking of engineering programs at universities in the United States, U.S. News and World Report has placed Cornell first in engineering science and engineering physics.

A new insight into cellular metabolism by Cornell researchers will help neurologists better interpret diagnostic tests

July 11, 2005
By discovering a crucial piece of submicroscopic information about how the brain converts fuel into energy for neurons, Cornell University biophysicists have gleaned new insights into brain cell metabolism that will allow neurologists to better interpret data from such diagnostic tests as positron emission tomography (PET) scans and a specialized magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) test.

Paul Hartman, pioneering Cornell physicist, historian and '100 percent human being' dies at 91

May 27, 2005
ITHACA, N.Y. -- Paul Leon Hartman, a pioneering researcher and Cornell University professor emeritus recognized by his colleagues for his grace and humility, died at his home at Kendal at Ithaca on May 20. He was 91.

After quantum dots, now come glowing 'Cornell dots,' for biological tagging, imaging and optical computing

May 19, 2005
Move over, quantum dots. Make way for the new kids on the block Ð brightly glowing nanoparticles dubbed "Cornell dots."

From attograms to Daltons: Cornell NEMS device detects the mass of a single DNA molecule

May 18, 2005
Some people are never satisfied. First, nanotechnology researchers at Cornell University built a device so sensitive it could detect the mass of a single bacterium--about 665 femtograms. Then they built one that could sense the presence of a single virus -- about 1.5 femtograms. Now, with a refined technique, they have detected a single DNA molecule, weighing in at 995,000 Daltons -- a shade more than 1 attogram -- and can even count the number of DNA molecules attached to a single receptor by noting the difference in mass.

After 150 years of research, discovery of how flames burn is finally made by Cornell scientist named Cool

May 13, 2005
Scientists have discovered compounds nearly ubiquitous in fire that have amazingly eluded detection in spite of 150 years of research on how flames burn. According to a paper in the journal Science on its Science Express Web site (May 12), co-authored by a Cornell University professor, enols, technically in the family of alcohols, are part of the chemical pathway that occurs when a wide variety of fires burn.

NSF awards Cornell $18 million to develop a new source of X-rays

February 21, 2005
The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded Cornell University $18 million to begin development of a new, advanced synchrotron radiation x-ray source, called an Energy Recovery Linac (ERL). The ERL, based on accelerator physics and superconducting microwave technology in which Cornell's Laboratory of Elementary Particle Physics (LEPP) is a world leader, will enable investigations of matter that are impossible to perform with existing X-ray sources.

Cornell's tiny, vibrating paddle oscillator senses the mass of a virus

November 4, 2004
By using a device only six-millionths of a meter long, researchers at Cornell University have been able to detect the presence of as few as a half-dozen viruses -- and they believe the device is sensitive enough to notice just one. The research could lead to simple detectors capable of differentiating between a wide variety of pathogens,including viruses, bacteria and toxic organic chemicals.

'Polymers and Biophysics' is focus of Henri Sack Memorial lecture Oct. 14

October 14, 2004
David R. Nelson '72, Ph.D. '75, the Mary Shepard B. Upson Visiting Professor at Cornell and the Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics at Harvard University, will present the Henri Sack Memorial Lecture on Thursday, Oct. 14, at 7 p.m. in Schwartz Auditorium, Rockefeller Hall. His lecture, which is free and open to the public, is titled "Polymers and Biophysics."

With dance and tributes, Duffield is dedicated

October 13, 2004
Its lights shining from every window, as if it were some giant ocean liner ready to set sail across the re-landscaped Pew Engineering Quad, Duffield Hall, the new high-tech landmark on the Cornell campus, was dedicated by President Jeffrey S. Lehman, Oct. 6.

Nanodevices target viruses

October 8, 2004
Physicists are used to detecting inanimate objects like photons and particles but two teams of researchers in the US have now turned their attention to very different targets -- viruses. Harold Craighead and colleagues at Cornell University used a nanoelectromechanical device to detect an insect baculovirus, while Charles Lieber and co-workers at Harvard University employed a nanowire field-effect transistor to detect single influenza viruses. The new methods could be scaled up for applications in medicine or the detection of biological weapons.

Duffield Hall - A Beacon for Reseachers

October 6, 2004
With the grand opening and dedication of Duffield Hall on Oct. 6, 2004, Cornell University is uniquely poised to serve the needs of nanoscale scientists at Cornell, across the nation and around the world. Whether they meet in the cantilevered conference room overlooking the Engineering Quad, in the clean rooms of the Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility and the Nanobiotechnology Center, in state-of-the-art faculty labs or the flexible graduate student space, Duffield Hall is a beacon for researchers whose work is measured on the smallest of scales.

Plasma studies unwinds a powerful COBRA for high-density simulations

September 9, 2004
The future of fusion power may lie not in a 20 million-ampere bang, but a 1-million-ampere pop. "It's not as intense. You can take data more readily," explains Bruce Kusse, Director of the Laboratory of Plasma Studies at Cornell, describing COBRA 1-MA, a new machine capable of generating brief but intense bursts of X-rays by releasing a million amperes into a few wires in such a short time that the wires implode and are literally annihilated. The temperature created is so high that atoms are broken apart into ions and electrons, a state of matter known as a plasma.

The ability to create nothing could result in novel way to make circuits at atomic scale, Cornell-led group discovers

August 23, 2004
Time is fast running out for the semiconductor industry as transistors become ever smaller and their insulating layers of silicon dioxide, already only atoms in thickness, reach maximum shrinkage. In addition, the thinner the silicon layer becomes, the greater the amount of chemical dopants that must be used to maintain electrical contact. And the limit here also is close to being reached.

CU laser microscopy technique settles brain chemistry debate, could aid studies of Alzheimer's, stroke damage

July 1, 2004
A laser-based microscopy technique may have settled a long-standing debate among neuroscientists about how brain cells process energy -- while explaining what's really happening in PET (positron emission tomography) imaging and offering a better way to observe the damage that strokes and neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's, wreak on brain cells.

Cornell to dedicate world-class facility for research, education, training of next generation of X-ray beam scientists and builders June 15

June 10, 2004
A remarkable facility producing some of the world's most intense X-ray beams for research, education and training will be dedicated at Cornell Univeristy Tuesday, June 15. Known as G-line, it is the world's only such center on the central campus of a major research university.

Cornell researchers move beyond 'nano' to 'atto' to build a scale sensitive enough to weigh a virus

April 2, 2004
Cornell University researchers already have been able to detect the mass of a single cell using submicroscopic devices. Now they're zeroing in on viruses. And the scale of their work is becoming so indescribably small that they have moved beyond the prefixes "nano" "pico" and "femto" to "atto." And just in sight is "zepto."

New Kavli Institute at CU to explore future of nanoscale science

March 11, 2004
A $7.5 million grant to Cornell from Fred Kavli and the Kavli Foundation of Oxnard, Calif., will endow the newly established Kavli Institute for Nanoscale Science, foundation and university officials announced March 10 in New York City.

Attogram Mass Detection

February 18, 2004
Attogram mass detection has been achieved by Harold Craighead and his colleagues at Cornell, with prospects of exquisite detection of very tiny chemical and biological species, possibly with arrays of detectors. With their lithographically fabricated nanoelectromechanical (NEMS) device, the Cornell researchers can measure the mass of a particle with a sensitivity of 10-18 grams, far exceeding the precision of a comparable device with femtogram (10-15 g) sensitivity reported last year. To get any better measurement of mass you would have to vaporize the particle and shoot its constituent molecules through a mass spectrometer.

New optical recording technique can see millisecond nerve impulses in healthy and diseased brains, Cornell biophysicists report

February 13, 2004
Combining the bright laser light of multiphoton microscopy with specially developed dyes and a phenomenon called second-harmonic generation, biophysicists at Cornell University and Université de Rennes, France, have made high-resolution images of millisecond-by-millisecond signaling through nerve cells.

A new Cornell 'nanoguitar,' played by a laser, offers promise of applications in electronics and sensing

November 17, 2003
Six years ago Cornell University researchers built the world's smallest guitar -- about the size of a red blood cell -- to demonstrate the possibility of manufacturing tiny mechanical devices using techniques originally designed for building microelectronic circuits. Now, by "playing" a new, streamlined nanoguitar, Cornell physicists are demonstrating how such devices could substitute for electronic circuit components to make circuits smaller, cheaper and more energy-efficient.

Team from Cornell, including two grad students, wins international prize for top invention of year

October 27, 2003
Two Cornell University graduate students and a researcher have won a top prize in the 2003 Collegiate Inventors Competition for building an utlra-small electronic generator. Their award of $25,000 was presented at a ceremony at the New York Public Library, Manhattan, on Oct. 23. The three are applied physics student Keith Aubin, mechanical engineering student Robert Reichenbach and research associate Maxim Zalalutdinov. Their advisers on the project, Harold Craighead, Cornell professor of applied and engineering physics, and Jeevak Parpia, Cornell professor of physics, shared a $5,000 prize.

Morphing membranes: Cornell-led team makes first observation of essential cellular life process

October 22, 2003
Cell membranes -- the sacs encompassing the body's living matter -- can assume a variety of shapes as they morph to engulf materials, expel others and assemble themselves into tissues. In the past it was possible for theoreticians only to analyze the thermodynamic forces behind membrane shape-shifting. But now a team of biophysicists from Cornell University, the National Institutes of Health and the W.M. Keck Foundation has been able to watch the sacs, or vesicles, reshaping themselves under the light of multiphoton three-dimensional microscopy. The forces behind the membrane morphing, the researchers say, is akin to a party entertainer shaping balloon animals by tensioning the surfaces.

Symposium offers small solutions to big medical challenges

July 10, 2003
At the NBTC's annual research symposium June 27, Cornell scientists and their collaborators met to discuss new developments in the fledgling field of nanobiotechnology. Speakers from universities and laboratories across the country, as well as Dublin City University and the University of Glasgow, met in the Biotechnology Building to share ideas and give updates on the progress of their research. The talks were followed by a poster session in Clark Hall, where the work of 47 NBTC projects was on display.

Cornell senior helps to prepare the Mars rovers' to-do lists for JPL

July 10, 2003
An applied engineering physics major with a minor in computer science, Wick has an instinct for tinkering that has come a long way from light switches. For the past three years he has been the only Cornell undergraduate working with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., writing software that will help scientists schedule the daily itineraries of the twin Mars Exploration Rovers (MER).

CU research finding opens applications in medical imaging

June 26, 2003
Twelve years after its patent was granted, the technique called multiphoton microscopy appears ready to move from the realm of biological research to medical imaging. In a series of three papers published this spring in the scientific literature, Watt W. Webb, Cornell's Eckert Professor of Engineering and co-inventor, with Winifried Denk, of multiphoton microscopy, displayed images of living tissue with details that rivaled -- and in some cases surpassed -- those from more traditional imaging processes.

Optical biopsies on horizon using noninvasive biomedical imaging technique developed by Cornell-Harvard group

June 11, 2003
A new imaging technique that could lead to optical biopsies without removal of tissue is being reported by biophysical scientists at Cornell and Harvard universities. The advance in biomedical imaging enables noninvasive microscopy scans through the surface of intact organs or body systems. Demonstrations of the new technique are producing images of diseased tissue at the cellular level with unprecedented detail.

Birth of a neuron: Imaging technique tracks nervous systemgrowth and repair, Cornell-Harvard group reports

June 10, 2003
A biomedical-imaging technique that would highlight the cytoskeletal infrastructure of nerve cells and map the nervous system as it develops and struggles to repair itself has been proposed by biophysics researchers at Cornell and Harvard universities.

3-D imaging inside living organism, using quantum dots coursing through mouse's body, reported by Cornell researchers

May 29, 2003
Tiny blood vessels, viewed beneath a mouse's skin with a newly developed application of multiphoton microscopy, appear so bright and vivid in high-resolution images that researchers can see the vessel walls ripple with each heartbeat -- 640 times a minute.

CU leads group in DOE-funded effort to help develop fusion power source

May 8, 2003
Cornell is leading a newly formed international consortium of six universities and institutes collaborating on high-energy density plasma research, with the aim of developing a promising fusion power source.

New Center Established for High Energy Density Plasma Research

April 23, 2003
Laboratory of Plasma Studies Professors David A. Hammer (Electrical and Computer Engineering) and Bruce R. Kusse (Applied and Engineering Physics) have been awarded a three-year cooperative agreement with the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Agency to establish the Center for the Study of Pulsed-power-driven High Energy Density Plasmas.

Seeing atoms in action: CU electron microscope to make huge advance

April 10, 2003
An early look at Cornell's next major advance in microscopy was provided on April 4 at the 20th annual Cornell Society of Engineers (CSE) conference on campus. The new scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM) will be installed in the nearly completed Duffield Hall when the machine arrives early next year. The microscope, which will be part of a larger instrumental development in Duffield, was termed "a paradigm shift of huge proportions" by Philip Batson '70, Ph.D. '76, of IBM Research Labs. Said Batson's long-time collaborator, John Silcox, Cornell vice provost for physical sciences, "This is going to be a very exciting instrument."

CU researchers create microchip to view single molecules in natural state

February 6, 2003
The technique, made possible by the ability of nanofabrication to produce a microchip with light-impeding holes with a diameter one-tenth of the wavelength of light, could promise a new method of DNA sequencing by which the genetic code can be "read" from a single DNA molecule.

CU spinoff, Nanofluidics, gets rights to gene-sequencing technique

February 6, 2003
Nanofluidics Inc., a small Ithaca concern spun off by Cornell in 2001, has obtained an exclusive worldwide license from the university to the key nano-optical technology detailed in the latest issue of Science magazine. The company, which is partly owned by Cornell, says the technology promises to facilitate the sequencing of an entire genome in hours, rather than years as with conventional techniques. The license start date was June 1, 2002.

University hosted first Japan-U.S. nanotechnology symposium

January 30, 2003
Manipulating materials and devices at the ultrasmall level of one-millionth the size of a pinhead was the focus for three days at Cornell last week when 20 leading Japanese researchers, 20 U.S. researchers and five top officials from the National Science Foundation (NSF) held the first in a series of symposia on nanotechnology.

Cornell scientists create microchip with light-impeding holes for detailed, optical observation of single molecules in their natural state

January 30, 2003
Using a novel technique, supported largely by off-the-shelf instruments, scientists at Cornell University have for the first time optically isolated individual biological molecules in naturally occurring molecular concentrations and watched their complex behavior as they interact with a protein.

Craighead awarded $750,000 by state to further research

December 5, 2002
Cornell engineer and physicist Harold Craighead has been awarded $750,000 by a New York state research agency to develop a chip-based analytical system for rapid analysis of chemical and biological compounds.

Richard Lovelace, Professor of Applied and Engineering Physics and a member of the Department of Astronomy, has been elected a fellow of the American Physical Society (APS).

November 21, 2002
The citation on the fellowship certificate, which was presented the week of Nov. 11-15 at the APS Division of Plasma Physics annual meeting in Orlando, Fla., reads: "For pioneering contributions to the physics of astrophysical jets and disks, the discovery of the period of the Crab Nebula pulsar and the study of turbulence in the interplanetary medium." Election to fellowship in the APS is limited to no more than one half of one percent of the membership. Lovelace, who obtained his Ph.D. at Cornell in 1970, directs his research at understanding the influence of ordered magnetic fields on the dynamics and evolution of protostellar disks and associated outflows.

Hess and Webb Paper is Cover of October Biophysical Journal

October 1, 2002
Sam Hess and Watt W. Webb's paper, "Focal Volume Optics and Experimental Artifacts in Confocal Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy," was chosen as the cover paper for the prestigious Biophysical Journal for October 2002.

Researchers' new DNA separation method could speed gene sequencing

September 26, 2002
Cornell researchers have demonstrated a novel method of separating DNA molecules by length. The technique eventually might be used to create chips or other microscopic devices to automate and speed up gene sequencing and DNA fingerprinting.

New DNA separation method could bring faster gene sequencing and DNA fingerprinting, Cornell researchers report

September 23, 2002
Cornell University researchers have demonstrated a novel method of separating DNA molecules by length. The technique might eventually be used to create chips or other microscopic devices to automate and speed up gene sequencing and DNA fingerprinting.

What Makes Cornell NanoSmart?

August 1, 2002
The Cornell faculty have proven that they can collaborate effectively in nanoscience and nanotechnology research. The success of several interdisciplinary faculty groups in winning support to carry out innovative work in the research centers described in this issue shows this. However, how did Cornell actually become nanosmart? A deeper question is: Why is Cornell able to collaborate so effectively across the disciplines? How did this develop, and why can Cornell do it? Does it happen spontaneously, and why does it happen when it does? How fragile is this culture, and how can Cornell sustain it? As a longtime faculty member at Cornell, my answer to these questions reflects a particular view of the history and the people who brought us to this point.

Researchers: Disorder forces DNA molecules out of confined spaces

May 9, 2002
A new understanding of how large biological molecules behave in tiny spaces could lead to a method for separating DNA strands by length. It also could throw light on the way molecules move in living cells.

Lois Pollack: Conversion of a 'traditional physicist'

May 9, 2002
When Lois Pollack launched a new course, the Physics of Life, she was aiming at sophomore-level undergraduates. An assistant professor of applied and engineering physics, she was surprised on the first day of class to find graduate as well as undergraduate students in fields ranging from materials science to operations research. All were eager to explore the physical interactions within and among biological macromolecules.

What forces DNA molecules through tight spaces? Not elasticity but disorder, Cornell researchers discover

May 2, 2002
A new understanding of how large biological molecules behave in tiny spaces could lead to a method for separating DNA strands by length. It also could throw light on the way molecules move in living cells.

Four undergrads win Goldwater Scholarships in sciences, engineering

April 11, 2002
The students are sophomores Peter M. Clark of Flemington, N.J., majoring in biology, chemistry and mathematics, and Matthew Moake of Cedaredge, Colo., majoring in biology; and juniors Adam Berman of Bethesda, Md., majoring in engineering physics, and Yolanda Tseng of San Jose, Calif., majoring in biological engineering.

Cornell nanotech center shows teachers how to excite students with physics

April 4, 2002
A new Cornell nanotechnology program is helping New York state's high school physics teachers make science come alive for their students.

The Biomedical Engineering Puzzle

March 1, 2002
Cutting edge research in fields where engineering and biology meet is nothing new at the College of Engineering. But this academic year marks an initiative to make that research more visible nationally in a more unified fashion.

NSF awards CU $11.6 million for Center for Nanoscale Systems in IT

September 20, 2001
The National Science Foundation (NSF) announced Sept. 19 that Cornell will be the home of a Center for Nanoscale Systems in Information Technologies. The grant is $11.6 million over five years.

Cornell engineer gets DOE contract to study combustion chemistry

August 31, 2001
Terrill Cool, professor of applied and engineering physics at Cornell University, has been awarded $354,000 by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for a three-year study of combustion chemistry.

Defense contracts awarded to two Cornell researchers exploring frontier of ultra-small electronics technology

August 21, 2001
Two groups of Cornell University researchers have been awarded U.S. defense agency contracts aimed at exploring a new generation of electronics technology at the molecular and nanoscale levels. The goals of the two programs are to investigate the possibility of developing new devices that ultimately could lead to huge increases in data storage and processing speed.

Closing of Ward Center and its nuclear reactor is announced by Cornell University administration

May 4, 2001
The Cornell University administration has announced its decision to decommission the TRIGA Mark II nuclear reactor and to phase out activities at the Ward Center for Nuclear Sciences, where the reactor is housed. The small, 500-kilowatt reactor has been used for research and teaching.

Can computers be tamed? Hewlett-Packard engineer will probe question in Henri Sack Memorial Lecture, April 11, at Cornell

April 3, 2001
"The Domestication of Computers" will be the topic for Joel S. Birnbaum, senior technical adviser at Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP), in the Henri Sack Memorial Lecture Wednesday, April 11, at 4 p.m. in Schwartz Auditorium of Rockefeller Hall at Cornell University.

Nobel Laureate Neher to present colloquium at Cornell, March 30

March 26, 2001
The colloquium, jointly sponsored by Cornell's School of Applied and Engineering Physics, the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics and the graduate field of biophysics, is titled "Exploring the Functional Role of Synaptic Proteins With Rapid Techniques."

Craighead reports on use of nanotechnology to count biological molecules

February 22, 2001
Up to now, most biologists have studied the molecules of life in test tubes, watching how large numbers of them behave. But now Cornell researchers are using nanotechnology to build microscopic silicon devices with features comparable in size to DNA, proteins and other biological molecules -- to count molecules, analyze them, separate them, perhaps even work with them one at a time. The work is called "nanofluidics."

W.M. Keck Foundation gives $1.5 million to start research/training program at Cornell and Weill Medical College to learn how cells communicate

February 19, 2001
A $1.5 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation has established a research/training program in biophysics to be conducted jointly by Cornell University in Ithaca and Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City.

Cornell researchers replace test tube with tiny silicon devices to rapidly measure, count and sort biological molecules

February 15, 2001
Up to now, most biologists have studied the molecules of life in test tubes, watching how large numbers of them behave.

CU nanobiotechnologists create biomolecular motors with propellers

November 30, 2000
Nanobiotechnologists at Cornell have built and pilot-tested the first biomolecular motors with tiny metal propellers.

A New Engineer: Andrew Spence

September 15, 2000
A prototype of the next generation of scientists, Andrew Spence moves easily across disciplinary boundaries to create new knowledge at the interface of biology and engineering.

Researchers are anticipating CU's 'national resource'

September 14, 2000
Some time in 2003, one of the most intricate and carefully planned moves in the history of Cornell will begin. Piece by piece, over about four months, 40 major instruments, such as optical lithography steppers and ion beam etching systems, will be moved through a specially constructed clean corridor into a new facility. Amazingly, while this is going on, researchers from around the country will continue their work without interruption

Harold Craighead: 'The idea is catching fire all over the world'

September 14, 2000
One of the most promising fields to emerge from the collaboration of life scientists with engineers and physicists is nanobiotechnology. Researchers in this exciting new field use the tools and processes of microfabrication on the "nano" scale (increments of a billionth of a meter) to build devices that examine biological systems. And the researchers apply what they learn about biology to create even better nanodevices.

Webb awarded the Rank Prize for Opto-electronics

August 17, 2000
Biophysicist Watt W. Webb, the S.B. Eckert Professor in Engineering, has been awarded the Rank Prize for Opto-electronics, together with Winfried Denk of the Max-Planck Institute for Medical Research, for their invention of multiphoton fluorescence microscopy.

Cornell nano-researchers create component for a 'lab on a chip' that cuts DNA separation from a day to a matter of minutes

May 30, 2000
Researchers have long sought to create a "laboratory on a chip" that could greatly speed up the process of DNA sequencing. That goal has come a step closer with the announcement that Cornell University researchers have built and tested a nanofabricated device that can separate DNA fragments by length.

Nanobiotech workshop brings engineers and biologists face-to-face

May 4, 2000
An attempt to bridge the communications gap between two very different disciplines brought researchers from the engineering and the physical sciences face to face with specialists in the life sciences at a daylong workshop April 29 at the state Cultural Education Center in Albany. The meeting was essential, said co-organizer Michael Isaacson, Cornell professor of applied and engineering physics, because "we speak different languages

CU's new Keck program in nanobiotech supports graduate scientists

April 27, 2000
The emerging field of nanobiotechnology could hasten the creation of useful ultra-small devices that mimic living biological systems -- if only biologists knew more about nanotechnology and engineers understood more biology.

Sen. Charles Schumer hears from Cornell researchers about need for federal aid to bring biotechnology to market

November 22, 1999
New York's junior U.S. senator, Charles E. Schumer, visited Cornell University Monday, Dec. 20, to hear from university researchers and administrators about how the federal government can help improve the process of bringing the fruits of the university's biotechnology research to market.

CU researchers study how DNA molecules squeeze through small spaces

October 7, 1999
On a steeplechase track about half the width of a human hair, Cornell researchers are racing individual DNA molecules to learn how they move through tiny spaces. One of the surprising results: Large DNA molecules squeeze through certain small spaces faster than small ones.

Cornell physicists report a breakthrough in writing data to magnetic chips that could store 'terabits' of information

August 23, 1999
Cornell University researchers have demonstrated a new way to write information to magnetic material that could lead to new computer memory chips that will have a very high storage capacity and will be non-volatile, meaning they would not require a constant electric current flowing to maintain stored information.

National Science Foundation funding launches Nanobiotechnology Center at Cornell

July 30, 1999
An agreement by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to fund a Cornell University-based consortium of institutions will help to establish the new Nanobiotechnology Center (NBTC) here. NSF funding over a five-year period could reach $19 million.

Cornell scientists were finalists for the 10th Discover innovation prizes

June 17, 1999
Two Cornell developers of advanced technology -- laser scanning multiphoton microscopy and nanofabricated molecular motors -- were among 27 finalists in the 10th Annual Discover Magazine Awards for Technological Innovation.

Major addition will give Cornell's high-energy X-ray facility a quantum leap in on-campus research

June 1, 1999
The Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS), one of the world's leading centers for X-ray research in biology and materials science, is building a major addition that will provide a quantum leap in its capabilities.

Webb wins Case Western Reserve's Michelson-Morley award

April 29, 1999
Watt Webb, professor of applied physics and the S.B. Eckert Professor in Engineering at Cornell, has been named the 1999 recipient of the Michelson-Morley award. The award is given by Case Western Reserve University to recognize outstanding achievements in the sciences.

Nanofabricated artificial gels could replace cumbersome organic polymers to speed DNA sequencing

March 25, 1999
It could be a scene from a movie: A doctor puts a drop of blood into a small hand-held device and instantly reads out a complete DNA analysis. But it would have to be a science fiction movie, because in real life machines that analyze DNA are about the size of a refrigerator. And hundreds of them, working for the past 10 years, haven't been able to map the equivalent of one person's DNA.

Possible computer data storage system smaller than a dot on this page is described by Cornell University researchers

March 23, 1999
Researchers at Cornell University are testing devices that could form the basis for a potential ultrasmall computer data storage system that could gather up to 100 times as much information in the same space as present-day magnetic data disks. An array of the devices that make up the system is considerably smaller than the period at the end of this sentence.

Cornell plucks its latest microscopic stringed instrument to study vibrating materials at record high frequencies

March 23, 1999
From the folks who brought you the world's smallest guitar, now meet the nanoharp.

Watt W. Webb, professor in the School of Applied and Engineering Physics, named as a Samuel B. Eckert Professor.

December 10, 1998
Watt W. Webb, professor in the School of Applied and Engineering Physics, named as a Samuel B. Eckert Professor.

Science research at Cornell has a new administrative team at its helm

September 17, 1998
Cornell's research administration has taken on a new guise -- a quadrumvirate of vice provosts headed by Nobel Laureate Robert C. Richardson, the Floyd R. Newman Professor of Physics. As the university's new vice provost for research, Richardson will carry out a program based on the premise, he said, that "we have to make parts of the university much stronger, and keep the strong parts strong."

Cornell-developed biosensors detect E. coli in food

April 16, 1998
Detecting potentially deadly bacteria in food, the water supply or on the battlefield before it does damage has never been reliable or fast enough to prevent death, illness or economic loss. As just one example, last year a Columbus, Neb., beef-processing plant was forced to recall 25 million pounds of hamburger when less than a speck of bacteria was detected.

Cornell scientists put their 'stamp' on a new device to seek out deadly bacteria in food or the environment

April 7, 1998
Detecting potentially deadly bacteria in food, the water supply or on the battlefield before it does damage has never been reliable or fast enough to prevent death, illness or economic loss. As just one example, last year a Columbus, Neb., beef-processing plant was forced to recall 25 million pounds of hamburger when less than a speck of bacteria was detected.

Cornell research into promising energy system that is suspended by wires

March 28, 1998
In the basement of a Cornell University engineering building, a large aluminum cylinder envelops microexplosions that one day, given sufficient federal funding, could contribute to developing the world's major hope for efficient electricity generation.

CU technology creates new nano-sized devices

August 14, 1997
The world's smallest guitar ­ carved out of crystalline silicon and no larger than a single cell ­ has been made at Cornell to demonstrate a new technology that could have a variety of uses in fiber optics, displays, sensors and electronics.

World's smallest silicon mechanical devices are made at Cornell

July 27, 1997
The world's smallest guitar -- carved out of crystalline silicon and no larger than a single cell -- has been made at Cornell University to demonstrate a new technology that could have a variety of uses in fiber optics, displays, sensors and electronics.

An 'information superhighway' inside plant cells is discovered

June 26, 1997
An "information superhighway" inside plant cells allows chloroplasts -- the minuscule green bodies that carry out photosynthesis inside cells -- to communicate directly with each other, Cornell University scientists have found.

Cornell scientists are honored for their accomplishments

March 5, 1997
Two Cornell University scientists have been honored for their work: Riccardo Giovanelli, professor of astronomy, in astronomy and Watt W. Webb, professor of applied and engineering physics, in microscopy.

Researchers produce images showing neurotransmitter in live cells

January 30, 1997
Cornell researchers, using non-linear laser-microscope technology developed at Cornell, have produced images displaying the neurotransmitter serotonin in live cells in real time, and they have for the first time measured the concentration of serotonin in secretory granules.

Cornell chemists create world's smallest wires

September 6, 1996
Cornell University chemists have created the world's smallest wires and encased them in a plastic polymer, an accomplishment that could lead to a host of new electrical or optical uses at the nanometer scale.

Applied and Engineering Physics celebration will feature NSF director

August 29, 1996
Neal Lane, director of the National Science Foundation and a physicist by training, will be among the key speakers at the 50th anniversary celebration of Cornell's School of Applied and Engineering Physics (A&EP) on Sept. 20 and 21.

CU's Silcox is named microscopist of the year

August 29, 1996
John Silcox, the David E. Burr Professor of Engineering and director of the Materials Science Center at Cornell, has won the 1996 Distinguished Scientist Award in the Physical Sciences from the Microscopy Society of America.

Engineering physics senior will use his opportunity to serve his vision

May 23, 1996
Alan J. Renaud has news for Cornellians: The weather's not so bad in Ithaca. It's not even that cold.

CU-developed non-linear laser scanning microscopy opens door to new biomedical imaging techniques

February 15, 1996
Medical researchers who want to study the microscopic distributions of key pro teins, DNA, messenger signals, metabolic states and molecular mobility have a new tool that can show the activity and behavior of living cells under a variety of conditions.