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Biotech Science

Perfect Crystals Grown by Cancelling Out Gravity on Earth 83

Posted by Zonk from the hippies-across-the-globe-cheer dept.
willatnewscientist writes "Researchers in the Netherlands and Japan have found a way to grow perfect crystals in 'zero gravity' here on Earth. By exploiting the way a powerful magnet influences diamagnetic materials they have been able to grow protein crystals without the defects normally introduced as a result of gravity (The same trick has been used to levitate a frog before). Normally, such crystals are grown in space, such as aboard the International Space Station."
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Perfect Crystals Grown by Cancelling Out Gravity on Earth More

Perfect Crystals Grown by Cancelling Out Gravity on Earth

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  • Yes, but... (Score:5, Funny)

    by ChePibe ( 882378 ) on Saturday August 11, 2007 @04:25PM (#20197683)
    Did they grow the crystals INSIDE of a levitating frog?

    Now that would be cool.

    Mmmm... frog crystals...
  • The challenges poised to frog levitation is now classified as a defect caused by gravity? I thought it was usually the bugs that were misreported as features...

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      If the crystal growing frog eats the bugs, is that a feature?

  • One big problem. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jd ( 1658 ) <imipak@ y a hoo.com> on Saturday August 11, 2007 @04:36PM (#20197749) Homepage Journal
    It won't work for all types of crystal, only those with specific magnetic properties. Proteins are fine, but semiconductors - where defects in the tens of nanometers are highly significant - won't be growable this way. Of course, there's nothing to stop you launching a vaccuum flask-like container into space and have crystals grow in true microgravity conditions at a very very slow pace. Sadly, there isn't a market for million-dollar CPU cores.

    On the protein side, this will be interesting, though. As the article states, growing highly precise protein structures is a Big Deal and very very hard. The potential benefits to the medical industry are hard to predict, but will be significant. This isn't merely a fun exercise, this could have some very substantial benefits. Not sure if it could be used to amplify prions, but if it could, that would make studying the B**** so much easier.

    • Instead of `canceling' out the gravity, why not just average it out across all directions by simply rotating the thing that grows crystals?

      Just curious.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by Enlightenment ( 1073994 )
        But then it wouldn't grow symmetrically--you'd have to rotate it extremely fast, changing direction periodically and quickly, to achieve that sort of effect.

      • Re:One big problem. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by jd ( 1658 ) <imipak@ y a hoo.com> on Sunday August 12, 2007 @04:13AM (#20201239) Homepage Journal
        When you rotate something, provided it remains intact, you are changing the direction of all the particles constantly. This can be a good thing - you can create "artificial gravity" by spinning things up by using this method. Because more massive particles will have more inertia than lighter particles, it can also be used to separate things that are mixed together. This is how plasma is extracted from the other components in blood, for example. When things are loosely connected, there is also usually some dragging going on, which is why rapidly-spinning galaxies have a spiral shape. The extra distance the outside needs to travel is so great and the connection so weak that the arms are smeared backwards. For more tightly-connected things, there's usually some strain built up. Your computer's hard drive is probably spinning at 7200 revolutions per minute, which is equal to 120 times a second. The center of the spindle has a speed of zero feet per second. The outside of the drive is traveling at around 157 feet per second. That's not insignificant, although drives are built to easily withstand such stresses. I've seen many a hard drive fail due to head crashes and bearing failures, never deformed surfaces.

        This is not to say that spinning couldn't be used to prepare certain materials under certain conditions. As I said, separation is a major use for spinning, and artificial gravity is another. Don't ever be put off by people saying that something can't be used for X because the odds are that it IS used for Y and will be used for Z once someone figures out what Z is. Asking questions like this is important, because that's when intuition usually gets converted into inspiration.

    • Re:One big problem. (Score:5, Informative)

      by semiotec ( 948062 ) on Saturday August 11, 2007 @05:16PM (#20198013)
      1. likely won't work for all proteins. It seems this just allows the crystals to grow BIGGER (which is a very good thing) but doesn't actually make the process easier. Protein crystals are a bastard to grow, depending on a lot of things like solvent conditions, temperature, even vibrations and so on. They only used lysosome as a test, which had been done a long time ago, as a protein, it's easy to produce and purify. You can even order it by the grams cheaply from Sigma, it's sort of the biological equivalent of buying sugar and salt from the supermarket. Would be more interesting if they tackled something more difficult, like a big complex or something.

      2. Prions won't crytallise (easily...). They are fibrous. I think the closest type of things people have managed was fibrinogen, and they had to chop up that protein into its core region before it can be done (and it was a major finding when it was published). Prions in its "bad" form aggregates fast and is resistant to a lot of tricks to break it down. Furthermore, even prion in its "good" form seem to lack defined structure, so even the good form isn't going to crystallise that well.

    • "there isn't a market for million-dollar CPU cores"

      NASA and DARPA beg to differ...
    • Build a 5000-10000ft deep mine shaft, and install a "free fall" elevator lab. If it takes 10 seconds to grow crystals, you dont need much height to
      achieve zero g. Just make a 10sq platform, drop it... falll for 12 seconds.... then slow it down from 12 to 20.... bingo instant 10 second duration zero G LAB on earth.

      And just repeat.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mpe ( 36238 )
        Build a 5000-10000ft deep mine shaft, and install a "free fall" elevator lab. If it takes 10 seconds to grow crystals, you dont need much height to achieve zero g. Just make a 10sq platform, drop it... falll for 12 seconds.... then slow it down from 12 to 20.... bingo instant 10 second duration zero G LAB on earth.

        In something like half that time you are going to run into problems with terminal velocity. Unless you can find a way to make your shaft a decent vacuum.
    • I'm sure the gamer market will be buying those multi million dollar processors in a few more decades.

      Shortly thereafter, it will be a necessity in order to run the latest version of Windows.
    • Could the process be used to create Very-Very-Long chains of carbon tubes? Also, by changing the support catalyst, could a Silicon Alloy be used instead of Carbon?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by stolaf ( 123127 )
      Not only are most proteins not able to use this method, protein crystallography is still as much an art as a science. The process of forming a protein crystal requires a protein solution that very slowly becomes super-saturated to the point that the protein molecules start to clump together. To be any good for crystallography, that clumping has to be very controlled (slighly negative second virial coefficient.) If the clumping is too rapid or too favorable, the protein will just crash out like a scramble

  • The Incredible Levitating Frog (Score:5, Informative)

    by Jugalator ( 259273 ) on Saturday August 11, 2007 @04:44PM (#20197815) Journal

    The same trick has been used to levitate a frog before

    Here's the frog they're talking of:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Frog_diamagneti c_levitation.jpg [wikipedia.org]

    And here's a more boring example with graphite, although maybe more clear:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Diamagnetic_gra phite_levitation.jpg [wikipedia.org]

  • EBAY listing-- (Score:3, Funny)

    by tazsl ( 1133503 ) on Saturday August 11, 2007 @04:48PM (#20197845)
    1 levitating crystaline frog pendant--$2,300,000.21 Amaze your friends! Great school project! Requires 1 nuclear reactor(not included) Coming next week--antiproton earrings--

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kjella ( 173770 )
      I'll take the crystaline frog, please... the earrings would be a cool gift, but there's just no place in this universe anyone would wear them. Not unless they want to be the booming center of attention, anyway.
  • Now that we can make perfect crystals on the ground that leaves, let's see.... Tang and zero-G pens as the sole benefit of manned space flight.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Aladrin ( 926209 )
      We make the pens and Tang down here, too. Why do they get to stay?

      Or are you suggesting that we'd already have discovered and created these crystals on earth without that experiment? Why wouldn't we have created the pens and Tang here instead?

      Just because something has been done again in a different way doesn't mean the original way wasn't instrumental in finding it.
    • You forgot adult diapers...

      • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        You forgot adult diapers...


        uh-oh, you can tell from over there?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by joeme1 ( 959209 )
      What about Tempurpedic mattresses and all those hundreds of products on late night infomercials?

  • hmmm... (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by nowhere.elysium ( 924845 )
    am i alone in finding the levitating frog cooler? or is it just the weed talking again?

  • Null Gravity (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by hansamurai ( 907719 )
    The enemy's gate is down!
  • Any photographs of these perfect crystals created in this?

  • Think of the spin-off technologies (Score:4, Funny)

    by jollyreaper ( 513215 ) on Saturday August 11, 2007 @07:47PM (#20198885)
    Just imagine when they adapt this same technique to work with breasts!

  • Good science, bad headline (Score:5, Insightful)

    by viking80 ( 697716 ) on Saturday August 11, 2007 @08:00PM (#20198939) Journal
    I write this comment as I sit in my gravity canceling chair, sipping a coke contained in a gravity canceling device called a glass. Even the keyboard is supported by a gravity canceling surface I call a table.
    • Look, a levity canceling comment!
    • Their thing applies the force to all the molecules evenly, not just the bottom side. Maybe if you mentioned your pool!
    • There is a stark difference between canceling gravity out on an object via a boundary force (such as the electromagnetic forces that your chair exerts on you) - which causes stress on the object - and canceling gravity internal to the object, which does not.

      From a purely practical perspective, the main thing that determines the evolution of quantum waveforms (if you'll take that view of things) is the local energy levels - the particular forces that are superimposed to create the potential field are prett
  • the perfect Crystals. Where are the pics?
  • I wonder how affordable this is if it requires a 33 tesla magnet to run long enough for crystals to grow (weeks).
  • TFA says they're using a "33 Tesla magnet".

    What's with these weird, nonstandard units? How many lightning strikes per american football pitch is that? Or lightbulbs per library of congress?

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