Microscopic images that are now achievable at single-nanometer scales usually depict advanced materials or other ordered, inorganic substances. However, a team of researchers from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (S.V.Kalinin ) and North Carolina State University (A. Gruverman) have applied scanning probe microcopy to living biosystems - in this case to look at the structure of a butterfly's wing. The 5-nanometer resolution images, obtained with a technique called atomic force acoustic microscopy, depict the infinitesimally complex structures that underlie the functionality and delicate spectacle of the flying insect's wing. Using the instrument, researchers can see nanometer-sized structural elements at resolutions that roughly equal the size of a DNA molecule. ORNL researcher Sergei Kalinin says the butterfly images are just a proof on concept - the new strides in advanced scanning probe microscopies will eventually provide a "wonderful tool" for understanding, as well as viewing, properties and functionality of living biosystem's on length scales from macroscopic to molecular.
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