Read  UCLan news item on Manuela’s book:

UCLan physicist shares intriguing research findings through ground-breaking publication

A physicist from the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) undertaking world-leading research into the future uses of nanotechnology has just published her first book.

Self-Assembly of Flat Organic Molecules on Metal Surfaces (published by Springer) has been written by UCLan’s Dr Manuela Mura, Research Fellow in Computational Physics from the School of Computing, Engineering and Physical Sciences.

Based on her PhD thesis, which won the Tadion-Rideal Prize for Molecular Science from King’s College London, the book explains how to create a nano-fabric: single atom thin layers of biological molecules joined together through intricate patterns.

“It’s an extremely exciting research field,” explained Dr Mura. “Over the last 10 years the world has been involved in a technological revolution. Every day newer and smaller devices essential to daily life appear on the market. In the next generation of these products the application of nano-technology is going to play a major role.”

In her book Dr Mura uses one the world’s most powerful computational methods to explain how metal surfaces such as gold can be used to encourage the self-assembly of complex biological molecules, such as the derivatives of DNA, into structures reminiscent of the fabric of a knitted jumper.

Dr Mura added: “Imagine a world where a personal computer could fit inside the lenses of a pair of glasses or a mobile phone with the processing speed of today’s supercomputers. These are not fanciful predictions, they will happen.”