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| | | Frontiers explores new ideas in science, meeting the researchers whoÌýsee the world through fresh eyes and challenge existing theories - as well asÌýhearing fromÌýtheir critics. ManyÌýsuch developments create new ethical and moral questions and Frontiers is not afraid to consider these.
radioscience@bbc.co.uk | | | | | LISTEN AGAIN Ìý30 min | | | |
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|  | | | Optical Tweezers © Terry Miura |
Imagine being able to pick up and move a singleÌýmolecule....
Let there be light
Without light, we'd be in darkness - obvious enough. But scientists are realising that light has other useful properties.
Nano
At the nano-scale - a billionth of a metre - light can perform a handy task. It can grab and hold tiny particles.
Forces
In a concentrated beam of laser lightÌýthere are attractive and repulsive forces.Ìý These are strong enought to manipulate molecules.
Optical Tweezers
TheÌýlaser beams or 'tools'Ìýare known as ‘optical tweezers’ or ‘optical traps’
Muscle
Justin Molloy at the National Institute for Medical Research uses optical tweezers to investigate single strands of muscle.Ìý
He hopes to find out what happens to our individual muscle molecules as they contract and relax.
Light Power
And Pà l Ormos at the Biological Research Centre in Hungary is using light to build and drive tiny ‘lightmills’.Ìý
One day these might provide power for a microscopic laboratories, the so-called 'lab-on-a-chip'.
Peter Evans discovers that this technology could become one of science’s more versatile tools.
Next time:Ìý Great creatures of the deep | | |
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