A Pitt researcher and his student have been awarded prestigious prizes from the Foresight Nanotech Institute for their work in developing a “molecular Lego® set” that will enable, for the first time, the quick manufacture of sturdy, predictable nanostructures. More >

Both the ancient art of stained glass and the cutting-edge field of plasmonics rely on the oscillation of electrons in nanosize metal particles. But because electrons move nearly as fast as light, those oscillations have been difficult to observe and had never before been seen in motion. Now, in a paper published in the June 8 issue of the journal Nano Letters, Pitt researchers have demonstrated a microscopy technique that allows the movement of the plasmons to be seen for the first time, at a resolution a trillion times better than conventional techniques. More >

Pitt researcher Anna Balazs and her colleagues announced March 3 in the journal Nature that they have created self-assembling mixtures of nanoparticles and polymer layers that spontaneously assume different orientations. More >