DMREF: Collaborative Research: Digital Magnetic Handshake Materials, Structures, and Machines

非技术描述：复杂物体的制造是技术进步的关键引擎。学习在微观尺度上制造智能、数字化和机械功能的物体，可能与人类尺度的制造一样具有革命性。这项拨款将支持研究，以开发一种新的方式来实现这一具有挑战性的目标。它结合了两种技术：一种是现代磁性信息存储技术，它可以制造出任意形状的微型磁铁；另一种是超薄的柔性材料，它可以在微小的外力作用下弯曲。这些将与胶体系统、聚合物物理和分子生物学的设计原理相结合，以创造智能的、功能性的物体、机器和材料。这些碎片将以类似于DNA碱基结合的方式相互作用，磁铁扮演碱基对的角色，而薄材料扮演DNA主干的角色。磁性信息将决定多股股如何连接，形成复杂的结构和微米大小的机器，这些机器可以通过外部磁场控制。这些材料最终将对微工程产生根本性的影响，并具有从材料到医学的一系列潜在应用。因此，这项研究将促进科学的进步，最终使美国经济和社会受益。这项研究借鉴了各个领域的概念——一种多学科的方法，将有助于扩大代表性不足的群体在研究中的参与，并对工程和科学教育产生积极影响。例如，宏观类似物将被用于向上阿巴拉契亚地区的贫困社区解释DNA碱基切割及其组装成DNA折纸结构背后的基本原理。技术描述：这项资助将支持旨在建立一个新的自组装平台的研究，该平台使用带有磁握手的面板-磁偶极子的微观模式-使面板能够通过类似于DNA中的沃森-克里克碱基对的特定智能相互作用结合在一起。通过原子层沉积在纳米薄的弹性链上制造这些面板，面板序列将决定多个链如何相互连接，形成复杂的无系绳结构和微米大小的机器，这些机器可以通过外部磁场进行操作。这些握手面板将使用磁光记录（微米尺度）或商用扫描磁写入头（50纳米尺度）进行编程。由此产生的磁性胶体、链或网将从基板释放到溶液中，并允许弯曲、移动和根据其设计的相互作用组装。该基金的方法是整合设计、宏观模型、高级模拟和实验，以掌握这些磁性握手材料的程序化自组装。总体而言，该策略既利用了当前最先进的3D DNA组装背后的互补结合原理，又克服了其许多局限性，包括大大扩展了操作参数（如温度、溶剂等）的范围。由此产生的结构可以与其他光刻元件（电子，光学等）完全集成，并将在传感，驱动和微型机器人中具有广泛的应用。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Non-technical Description: Manufacturing of complex objects is the key engine of technological progress. Learning to build smart, digital, and mechanically functional objects at the microscale could be as revolutionary as human-scale manufacturing. This grant will support research to develop a new way of meeting this challenging goal. It combines two technologies: modern magnetic information storage, which can create tiny magnets in any pattern desired, and ultrathin flexible materials that can bend in response to tiny forces. These will be combined with the design principles of colloidal systems, polymer physics, and molecular biology to create intelligent, functional objects, machines, and materials. The pieces will interact in a way analogous to the way DNA bases bind together, with magnets playing the role of the base pairs, and the thin materials playing the role of the DNA backbone. The magnetic information will determine how multiple strands connect and form complex structures and micron sized machines that can be controlled with external magnetic fields. These materials will ultimately have fundamental impacts on micro-engineering, with a range of potential applications, from materials to medicine. As such, this research will promote the progress of science and ultimately benefit the US economy and society. This research borrows concepts from a variety of fields - a multi-disciplinary approach that will help broaden participation of underrepresented groups in research and positively impact engineering and science education. For example, macroscopic analogs will be adopted into lending kits that will be used to explain the basic principles behind base paring in DNA and its assembly into DNA origami structures to impoverished communities in upper Appalachia. Technical Description: This grant will support research aimed at building a new platform for self-assembly that uses panels with magnetic handshakes - microscopic patterns of magnetic dipoles - that enable panels to bond together using specific, intelligent interactions analogous to Watson-Crick base pairs in DNA. By fabricating these panels on nm thin elastic strands grown via atomic layer deposition, the panel sequence will determine how multiple strands connect to one another and form complex untethered structures and micron sized machines that can be manipulated with external magnetic fields. These handshake panels will be programmed using either magneto-optic recording (micron scale) or commercial scanned magnetic write head (50 nm scale). The resulting magnetic colloids, strands, or nets will be released from the substrate into solution, and allowed to bend, move, and assemble according to their designed interactions. The approach of the grant is to integrate design, macroscale models, advanced simulations, and experiment, to master the programmed self-assembly of these magnetic handshake materials. Overall, this strategy both takes advantage of the complementary binding principle behind current state of the art 3D DNA based assembly and overcomes many of its limitations, including vastly expanding the range of operating parameters such as temperature, solvent, etc. The resulting structures can be fully integrated with other lithographic elements (electronics, optics, etc.) and will have broad applications in sensing, actuation, and microrobotics at the cellular scale.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.