Cornell Gives President Clinton the World's Smallest Saxophone Source: Cornell University http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/July00/nanosax.ws.html
July 12, 2000
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- In the wake of the nanoguitar, now
there are 287,900 nanosaxophones.
The tiny instrument images, carved on a silicon chip by
engineers at the Cornell Nanofabrication Facility, together form a
centimeter-square silhouette of President Bill Clinton playing his
favorite musical instrument. The unique chip, embedded in a lucite
paperweight, will be presented to the White House staff today
(Wednesday, July 12) by Hunter Rawlings, president of Cornell
University.
"We are confident this is the smallest gift any
president has ever received," Rawlings said. He will present the
memento to John Podesta, Clinton's chief of staff, for inclusion in
the Clinton presidential library.
Each of the tiny saxophone images is about 6-by-8
millionths of a meter, or about the size of a red blood cell. Carved
onto a chip made of blue silicon nitride, they form the pixels of an
image based on a photo of Clinton taken at his 1993 inauguration as
governor of Arkansas.
The nanosaxophone was made, Rawlings said, to illustrate
the Cornell Nanofabrication Facility's ability to manufacture the
world's smallest devices, used in biology, medicine, chemistry,
electronics, optics and physics. The images were produced by an
advanced technique called electron beam lithography, which can form
objects about 10 times smaller than
photolithography, the method used to make most computer chips today.
Cornell nanofabricators attracted worldwide attention in
1997 when a graduate student used similar techniques to carve a
microscopic sculpture of a guitar onto a silicon chip. Although done
as a lark, the nanoguitar was a dramatic demonstration of the
potential of nanotechnology.
Rawlings will present the nanosaxophone as part of a
daylong series of events sponsored by the Science Coalition, a
consortium of universities and other research institutions formed to
encourage continued federal support for basic research.
The nanosaxophone chip was created by Cornell
Nanofabrication Facility staff members Richard Tiberio, Michael
Skvarla, Karlis Musa and Melanie-Claire Mallison, and undergraduate
research intern Teresa Emery. The paperweight in which it is mounted
was crafted by the Design and Fabrication Facility of the Cornell
University College of Engineering. The
project was directed by Alton Clark, associate director of the Cornell
Nanofabrication Facility.
Related World Wide Web sites: The following sites
provide additional information on this news release. Some might not
be part of the Cornell University community, and Cornell has no
control over their content or availability.
-- Cornell Nanofabrication
Facility: -- The nanoguitar story:
by Bill Steele
(607) 255-7164
ws21@cornell.edu
cunews@cornell.edu
http://www.news.cornell.edu
http://www.cnf.cornell.edu
http://www.news.cornell.edu/science/July97/guitar.ltb.html