Atomic chisel chips away at graphene

Researchers at Harvard University, FEI Corporation and the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab in US together with colleagues at Graphenea Ltd in Spain have invented a new atomic “chisel” made from a single silicon atom that can be used to sculpt and create ultraclean nanostructures in graphene. The tool, which overcomes Richard Smalley’s “fat finger” problem, could be used to fashion clean edges in the carbon material, fabricate a host of nanostructures for use in future molecular electronics devices and make nanopores for DNA sequencing applications.