Tiny Nano-Gears Could Power Your Portable Electronics

[unhappycamper]

http://cleantechnica.com/2014/04/07/new-piezoelectric-material-contains-nanogears/

Tiny Nano-Gears Could Power Your Portable Electronics

n a study of “some of the smallest moving elements ever observed,” researchers at Georgia Tech and the University of Toledo have confirmed the existence of synchronized, molecular “gears” in a self-assembling material. Like an array of micro machines, the gears rotate together when pressure is applied to the material, then resume their original position when pressure is released.

Since the Air Force Office of Scientific Research and Department of Energy both funded the molecular gear study, let’s see how that material could play into a new energy future of portable, microscale energy harvesting and storage devices.



Nanoscale Gears In A Superlattice

The self-assembling material, called a superlattice, really does behave like a nanoscale machine. It is composed of 500-atom nanoparticles made up of silver and organic molecules. Hydrogen bonds between the components form the hinges.

The nanoparticles self-assemble into a lattice-like structure and when pressure is applied, they shift around the hydrogen bonds to form a rotating movement. The movement itself is made possible by the open, crystalline structure of the nanoparticles.