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Tuesday, 3rd March 2009 (1427 views)

A study of how electrons flow through nanometre circuits has led to the discovery of an 'on and off' switch for electrical resistance, it has been announced.

Researchers at the US Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory discovered that pushing and pulling a junction-a feature in the circuit can control the flow of the current, leading to the possibility of the inclusion of a switch in nanotechnology devices, Insciences reports.

Scientist Jeff Neaton told the news source that understanding how the "intrinsic properties of a molecule or junction" is necessary for the creating of circuit elements on a molecular scale.

However, he noted that "knowing where each and every atom is in a single-molecule junction is simply beyond what's possible with experiments at this stage".

Elsewhere in the field of nanotechnology, gold has been used by a chemist at Cornell University to develop a way for farmers to track which treatments have been used on their crops, EarthSky reports.

 

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