Cutting-edge technologies and future developments in optical tweezersOptical tweezers technology will have a wide range of applications in the field of biological research.
1. The 2018 Nobel Prize was awarded to Arthur K. Ashkin, the inventor of optical tweezers. Ashkin, optical tweezers use "laser force" (light pressure, or radiation pressure), can manipulate very small objects, bacteria, cells, and even DNA, tiny objects can be in the case of not squeezed "space" to move. Optical tweezers are now widely used in biological research.
2, British and Spanish scientists for the first time the use of sound waves, the space to make tiny objects either suspended in the air, or at the same time will be a number of objects in different directions. Ultrasound can penetrate non-transparent barriers to a certain extent, which allows scientists to see the future of sound tweezers used directly in the field of medical applications, such as space surgery, drugs transported to the target organ and so on.
3. Because ultrasound can travel through human tissues, researchers believe that acoustic tweezers will have the ability to deliver drugs to specific organs, remove kidney stones, or guide implantable medical devices into the body in the future.
4, this research involves how to make lasers stronger, with powerful lasers we can do a lot of practical things, such as accurate, low-cost for particle acceleration, strong laser brings short pulses in turn, can help us in a simple and as little as possible to damage the eyeballs in order to correct vision.
Harnessing light at will
Eva Lindrot, a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, said in an interview, "With these optical tweezers, we are able to grab molecules, move them where you want them to go and start manipulating them, and that's a very practical tool, and in fact we use it a lot. "
With the new tool, formed by harnessing light, one can manipulate and move atoms, viruses and other living cells. Ashkin's invention has given researchers the opportunity to y analyze the molecular motors that play key roles within cells and explore the mechanisms at work without disrupting cell membranes. Today light tweezers are standard equipment in many biology labs.
Refer to Xinhua.com for the above - Making light a tool for miracles - Interpreting the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physics results
Refer to SciChina for the above - Using sound to pick up objects in space! Filling in the gaps of the new Nobel Prize results