Composites of polymers and inorganic nanoparticles offer tremendous promise for the optimization of mechanical properties. Although many claims of improved properties and balanced optimization can be found in the scientific literature over the past several decades, very little fundamental insight has been provided for the true "nano" effect on mechanical properties.

Expansion of the McNair CITIES ProgramThe MRSEC developed a new program to help enhance the curriculum of NYC high schools called the Ron McNair Curriculum Integration To Interactively Engage Students (CITIES) Program. The goals of the program are to increase student engagement and to motivate students to enjoy learning and to educate the public. In 2005, the MRSEC brought the program to a Enterprise, Business, and Technology (EBT) High School in Brooklyn.

Graphitic carbon - structural forms of the element that are constructed exclusively from carbon atoms having trigonal planar coordination - is ordinarily produced under drastic physical and conditions, typically at temperatures in excess of 500° C. Columbia MRSEC scientists have uncovered a process by which this form of matter can assemble at temperatures as low as 110° C. During their development of a low-temperature synthesis of nanocrystals of iron oxides, Drs.

UCSB MRL researchers have recently developed a new way of seeing beneath clothing and other materials using a THz imaging system that employs a photoconductive switch for illumination and a zero-biased, Schottky diode for detection. Just like Superman, this novel Terahertz system penetrates textiles, in this case denim cloth from jeans, but does not use ionizing radiation and therefore poses a significantly reduced risk to human health when compared to x-rays.

To a packed audience of over 200 students and local residents, the UCSB MRL supported a public lecture on the subject of solid state lighting, emphasizing the promise of a much cleaner, more efficient, and longer-lasting lighting source. Santa Barbara architect

The recent MRSEC Teacher Workshop at UCSB was a Great Success. Junior High and High School math and science teachers from Santa Barbara, Ventura and Los Angeles Counties visited the UCSB Materials Research Laboratory for a day of curriculum presentations and workshops.

In 2004, a Penn State MRSEC team showed that bimetallic platinum/gold nanorods could swim at speeds up to 20 microns per second by catalyzing the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide. Nickel stripes added to the motors allowed them to be steered using weak magnetic fields as a "remote control". Microgears formed from platinum and gold rotated in hydrogen peroxide solutions. In 2005, MRSEC researchers†have inverted the system: instead of moving catalytic structures through a static solution, a static silver/gold catalytic structure pumps the solution past it.

Scaling functional machines down to the molecular scale is a key challenge in nanoscale science and technology. However, coaxing individual molecules into performing well-defined mechanical tasks requires radically different strategies than those used to build familiar macroscopic machines like electrical motors.

Motor proteins deliver intracellular cargo to specific locations inside cells. These so-called kinesin motors take 8 nm steps along intracellular highways 25 nm wide called microtubules. This transport machinery can be reassembled outside the cell and used to transport nanoscale cargo for separations, sensors, assembly, and other bio-mechanical devices.

Electric-field tunable spin valves are being investigated Exchange bias at ferromagnet/multiferroic interfaces has been studied for various thin film and bulk multiferroics including BiFeO3, TbMnO3, LuMnO3, and Cr2O3. Tunable spin valve structures are being explored. Magnetoresistance devices using BiFeO3 as the exchange biasing layer have been demonstrated.