Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have developed a way to spontaneously form microscopic zinc oxide ribbons into coils of slinky-like perfect rings.
The single crystal rings are 300 nanometers wide, 10 nanometers thick and three microns long. The rings have potential uses as parts in nanomachines like blood pressure monitors, sensors, resonators, transducers, pumps, switches and actuators.
The material used is piezoelectric zinc oxide crystal formed into ribbons by mixing zinc oxide, indium oxide and lithium carbonate powders with argon gas and heating the mixture to 1,400 degrees Celsius. The temperature is then reduced to 400 degrees and pressure added.