Feb. 18, 2005 Physicists and biologists at Bristol University
are using the way that insects hear to devise new instruments
for use in nanoscience. Using these new tools will then allow
them to look even closer at how insects hear. This unusual
symbiotic relationship between physicists and biologists means
each helps the other’s science to progress. The Atomic Force
Microscope is the main tool used to obtain images at the atomic
scale. Likened to an old fashioned record player, it has an
‘arm’ that houses a highly sensitive probe. Much like a stylus
bumping around in the groove of a record, the probe moves across
the specimen, mapping its shape by ‘feeling’ the bumps. The
result is a three-dimensional map of the specimen’s surface.
However, when examining delicate biological material, such as
DNA, there is a risk that the probe might damage it. By
collaborating with colleagues in the Biology Department,
Professor Mervyn Miles and his researchers in Physics have used
the Atomic Force Microscope to ‘see’ the wa