text: The Nanodragster, dubbed the worlds smallest hot rod, is a molecular nanocar. The design improves on previous nanocar designs and is a step towards creating molecular machines. The name comes from the nanocars resemblance to a dragster, as its staggered wheel fitment has a shorter axle with smaller wheels in the front and a larger axle with larger wheels in the back.
  The nanocar was developed at  Rice University’s Richard E. Smalley Institute Nanoscale Science and Technology by the team of James Tour, Kevin Kelly and other colleagues involved in its research. The previous nanocar developed was 3 to 4 nanometers which was a little a strand of DNA and was around 20,000 times thinner than a human hair. These nanocars were built with carbon buckyballs as their four wheels, and the surface on which they were placed required a temperature of  to get it moving. On the other hand, a nanocar which utilized p-carborane wheels moves as if sliding on ice, rather than rolling. Such observations led to the production of nanocars which had both wheel designs.
  The nanodragster is 50,000 times thinner than a human hair and has a top speed of 0.014 millimeters per hour (0.0006 in/h or 3.89×10 m/s). The rear wheels are spherical fullerene molecules, or buckyballs, composed of sixty carbon atoms each, which are attracted to a dragstrip that is made up of a very fine layer of gold. This design also enabled Tour’s team to operate the device at lower temperatures.
  The nanodragster and other nano-machines are designed for use in transporting items. The technology can be used in manufacturing computer circuits and electronic components, or in conjunction with pharmaceuticals inside the human body. Tour also speculated that the knowledge gained from the nanocar research would help build efficient catalytic systems in the future.