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TOY HELPS RESEARCHERS' PROGRESS IN OPTICAL TECHNOLOGY
The toy turned out to be the thinga-ma-bob the researchers needed to generate a multitude of optical traps, which are vital to researchers who need to move and manipulate microscopic material with laserlike precision. After that success, the researchers developed their own methods for computing holograms specifically aimed at making optical traps. The holograms are proving valuable in developing the next generation of computer chips. "Computer holography has huge applications for three-dimensional displays and the next generation of microelectronic-chip fabrication," said David Grier, professor of physics at the university's Franck Institute for Biophysical Dynamics. Because of the super-serious implications, people jealously guard the algorithms that enable computer-generated holograms. (Remember the holographic image of Princess Leia projected by R2D2 in "Star Wars": "Help me, Obie-Wan?" or the images that magically appeared above the conference table during strategy sessions on Star Trek, The Next Generation?) So the U. of C. researchers came up with their own algorithms. They crossed a retinal scanner with a microscope and came up with what is now known as dynamic holographic optical tweezers. That's a fancy name for tweezer-like devices that let scientists grab and move teeny objects. Once again, as with the device they made that included the laser-light toy, they turned a jury-rigged piece of machinery into a cutting-edge platform. Their most recent advance is a microscopic pump powered by a beam of light, explained in the NewScientist magazine. The laser-powered pump requires no mechanical drive and could prove to be the answer to moving fluids inside tiny devices being developed to do laboratory tests. Though the work may sound like so much esoterica, it's the foundation upon which medical and computer advances may lie. Another example, to be cited in an upcoming issue of NewScientist magazine, is the kind of molecular-scale sorting that would let scientists select proteins according to whether they are left-handed or right-handed. "Some of our pharmaceuticals are proteins. If you try to synthesize them, you get a mixture of right- and left-handed forms," Grier explained. "For therapeutic purposes, you want the left hand. The wrong hand can have catastrophic consequences, like thalidomide." For readers too young to remember the tragedy of thalidomide babies, the use of the anti-nausea drug in the 1950s led to the birth of deformed and mentally disabled babies. A surprising advantage is that this method of optically sorting proteins is likely to be much cheaper than conventional techniques. "If you are going to be driven by your dreams, this is a good dream to have," Grier said.
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