Researchers have demonstrated the use of infrared laser light to quickly and precisely heat the water in 'nano bathtubs'
Researchers have demonstrated the use of infrared laser light to quickly and precisely heat the water in 'nano bathtubs'Scientists at the US Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics (JILA), Boulder, USA, have demonstrated the use of infrared laser light to quickly and precisely heat the water in "nano bathtubs" -- tiny sample containers -- for microscopy studies.
Infrared laser light heats the water in 'nano bathtub' for JILA research
on individual DNA molecules. Pic/JILAThe JILA "bathtubs" consist of about 35 picoliters (trillionths of a litre) of water on a glass slide. Gently focused infrared laser light is used to heat a nanoscale column of water. "Exact sizes of the laser beam and sample area don't matter. What's important is having time and temperature control over volumes of fluid small enough to be able to look at single molecules," says NIST/JILA Fellow David Nesbitt, senior author of the paper.
