Silicon mechanosynthesis demonstration (paper)

The special thing about this paper is that

• it was not about just swapping around very similar atoms Si and Sn (done in an other paper)
• it was not about just removing a single hydrogen atoms from a passivation layer and then deposit silicon by a gas phase process
• it was a bout really ripping a whole silicon atom out of the surface and putting it back

Make no mistake:

• achieving this feat with the technology of back then and (still now 2021) was probably many many many hours of work.
• this is still all very sketchy and statistical – a lot of unsuccessful tapping involved

Technology will have a long way to go till something like works really fast and reliable,
meaning at MHz level reaction rates and low error rated akin to digital logic.
But we'll eventually get there. Just like we got from relays to nanoscale transistors on chips.

External link to the paper

Ripping out and redepositing sigle silicon atoms on silicon surface:
Noriaki Oyabu, Oscar Custance, Insook Yi, Yasuhiro Sugawara, Seizo Morita, "Mechanical vertical manipulation of selected single atoms by soft nanoindentation using near contact Atomic Force Microscopy," Phys. Rev. Lett. 90(2 May 2003):176102; http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v90/e176102
pdf on academia.edu (78K)

Related

• Up: Experimental demonstrations of single atom manipulation
• Scanning probe microscopy
• Direct path