Building 'Digital Matter'

Research in diamond mechanosynthesis -- building diamond nanostructures atom by atom using scanning probe microscopy -- just received a major boost with a $3 million grant from the U.K. Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, awarded to Professor Philip Moriarty at the University of Nottingham for a "Digital Matter" project.

This is big news. It's the first time we've seen such significant government funding of research directly connected to molecular manufacturing.

We get more in the following press release from our colleagues at the Nanofactory Collaboration:

Professor Philip Moriarty of the Nanoscience Group in the School of Physics at the University of Nottingham (U.K.) has been awarded a five-year £1.53M ($3M) grant by the U.K. Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) to perform a series of laboratory experiments designed to investigate the possibility of diamond mechanosynthesis (DMS). DMS is a proposed method for building diamond nanostructures, atom by atom, using the techniques of scanning probe microscopy under ultra-high vacuum conditions. Moriarty’s project, titled “Digital Matter? Towards Mechanised Mechanosynthesis,” was funded under the Leadership Fellowship program of EPSRC. Moriarty’s experiments begin in October 2008.

The Nottingham work grew out of continuing discussions on DMS between Moriarty and Robert Freitas, a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Molecular Manufacturing (IMM) (Palo Alto, California, U.S.). These discussions started in January 2005.

Freitas and Ralph Merkle, also a Senior Fellow at IMM, founded the Nanofactory Collaboration in 2001 to pursue molecular manufacturing via DMS. Since then they have produced a series of papers reporting a set of careful density functional theory (DFT) and quantum chemistry calculations on fundamental mechanosynthetic reactions in diamondoid systems. In April 2008 the two IMM researchers published the results of a comprehensive three-year project to computationally analyze a complete set of DMS reaction sequences and an associated minimal set of tooltips that could be used to build basic diamond and graphene (e.g., carbon nanotube) structures. These structures include all of the tools themselves along with the necessary tool recharging reactions. A particularly useful result of this study was the proposal of an experimentally viable route towards the fabrication of a rechargeable toolset that can extract hydrogen, deposit carbon, and donate hydrogen to a diamond surface.

Moriarty is interested in testing the viability of positionally-controlled atom-by-atom fabrication of diamondoid materials as described in the Freitas-Merkle minimal toolset theory paper. Moriarty’s efforts will be the first time that specific predictions of DFT in the area of mechanosynthesis will be rigorously tested by experiment. His work also directly addresses the requirement for “proof of principle” mechanosynthesis experiments requested in the 2006 National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) review, in the 2007 Battelle/Foresight nanotechnology roadmap, and by EPSRC’s Strategic Advisor for Nanotechnology, Richard Jones (Physics, Sheffield University, U.K.).

“We congratulate Philip for his tremendous success in securing funding for this pathbreaking effort,” said Freitas. “We look forward to working together closely with his experimental team as this exciting project goes forward over the next five years.”

Comments

[jim moore]

Yes, this is really great news.
First, I would like to congratulate Rob, Ralph, and Philip. I am sure all involved can't wait to see if well chosen and well executed experiments confirm or cast doubt on the potential of mechanochemisty.

And if the good Dr. Moriarty is reading this, I would like to suggest that you add the carbon dimer to a sheet of graphene rather than a little chunk of diamond for a number of reasons:
1.) You can hold a sheet of graphene away from other surfaces = means easier to work on.
2.) By adding a dimer to the edge of a sheet of graphene you will change some electrical/ optical properties of that sheet of graphene = means easier to detect success.
3.) Graphene is at a lower energy state than diamond = means easier target to hit.
4.) Graphene is the new wonder material, and potential replacement for silicon based computers ( Neil Stephenson got it slightly wrong its not going to be the diamond age it will be the Graphene Age) = means lots more funding.

[Philip Moriarty]

Hi, Jim.

Thanks for your comments. It's important to note that the diamond mechanosynthesis proposal focuses specifically on diamond and, indeed, on a particular challenge which I first raised in my debate with Chris Phoenix a few years back: scanning probe "epitaxy" of a row of carbon dimers using purely force-driven reactions on hydrogen-passivated diamond. Rob Freitas and Ralph Merkle's recent minimal toolset paper has been particuarly important in defining the plan and objectives of the proposal and I want to stay focussed on this, rather than move to graphene.

Graphene is, of course, a very interesting system and it's possible that we may explore this in the course of the five year mechanosynthesis grant. My suspicion, however, is that achieving basic "mechanoepitaxy" on diamond will take at the very least five years!

As regards your points:

1. Being able to hold a sheet of graphene away from another surface may well be useful for longer term mechanosynthetic work but the primary objective of the EPSRC-funded work is to demonstrate the validity of a small number of mechanosynthesis reactions - which have been explored by Freitas and Merkle via DFT calculations using very many thousands of CPU hours - on a bulk diamond surface.

2. This is actually a rather challenging way of detecting a successful operation. It will be more straight-forward to use the scanning probe itself - through force-distance, I(V) and d2I/dV2 (inelastic) tunnelling spectroscopy - to monitor a successful mechanosynthesis reaction event.

3. The metastability of diamond with respect to graphite/graphene is not really an issue here. The H:C(100) surface represents an excellent platform for site specific scanning probe-driven chemistry. Drexler understood this very well - his choice of diamond(oid) in Nanosystems was very well-informed.

4. Hmmmm. Yes, graphene is certainly a well-funded area but it may not always be a good idea to chase current trends in order to secure money for research!

Best wishes,

Philip

[Tom Craver]

Philip:

Could you give a broad outline of what the task ahead of you will likely entail?

I.e. what has to be done to implement the reactions, to verify them, etc?

Assuming something doesn't work as projected from the computational chemistry, does the research include seeking out work-arounds?

[Philip Moriarty]

Hi, Tom.

A combination of low temperature tuning fork (Qplus) AFM, STM, and tunnelling spectroscopy (dI/dV and d2I/dV2, i.e. inelastic tunnelling spectroscopy) will be used to implement and/or characterise scanning probe-driven mechanosynthesis reactions on diamond (C(100)) in UHV and at temperatures in the 4 K - 300K range. Initially we will need to demonstrate atomic resolution on C(100). We will then explore some of the ideas in Freitas and Merkle's "minimal toolset" paper in order to extract hydrogen from a H-passivated C(100) surface and subsequently add a carbon dimer.

As regards verification, a key goal is for theory and experiment to run in parallel, one reinforcing the other. For example, we will aim to reproduce experimental force-distance spectra (measured as a tip approaches a diamond surface during a mechanosynthesis reaction) using DFT calculations. You ask whether the research includes "seeking out work-arounds". Yes, most definitely! There's an interesting quote from a recent international review of UK materials research that should be printed in bold capital letters on the front of all documentation produced by funding bodies, viz.: "Research is always about risk taking, no matter whether the risk involves failure to meet a certain set of expectations or failure to create truly new, significant knowledge or understanding of a problem. To be clear, if the outcome of the effort can be anticipated, it is highly questionable whether this effort should be called research."

When the project gets going I will aim to set up a blog that will report on progress.

Thanks for your interest and best wishes,

Philip

[Tom Craver]

Philip - Thanks for the feedback, and the planned blog - I'm sure many will follow your progress with interest.