New Tools for DNA Manipulation

This is a fairly interesting development - it seems that a Japanese company has developed some very small MEMS (micro electro-mechanical systems) designed to improve our ability to accurately manipulate strands of DNA without breaking them. Like many current systems they use optical tweezers to move the DNA strands around, but the novelty here are the micro 'bobbins' and 'hooks' that allow users to hold a strand in place and edit it. Kind of like a DNA sewing machine.

Infrastructure tools for the bio-design revolution - they arent really here yet, but when they are it may have systemic effects as profound as the development of the general purpose computer.

Nanoprinting Gets Better. Again.

Nanoprinting refers to the process of laying down very small (nanoscale) particles on a substrate with precision. This type of technology is an essential precursor to building a wide range of MEMs, micro machines and other nanotechnologies at anything approaching an industrial scale. IBM has been at the forefront of this effort after the first time researchers used a scanning tunneling electron microscope to draw the IBM logo with individual gold atoms.

This particular technology has a DPI (dots per inch) resolution of around 100,000 - or can print individual dots around 60 nanometers in size. This is quite good for a printing technology even if manual techniques currently allow the manipulation of single atoms in some environments.