Race a Nanocar

4 Wheels and a Chassis—All in One Winning Molecule?

"Divide a meter one billion times, and that's one nanometer. Our nanocar is four nanometers in length," explained doctoral students Mersad Raeisi and Kondalarao Kotturi.

They are part of an Ohio University team that worked on a "nanocar" that represented Ohio University and took third, racing on a track made of gold at the Nanocar Grand Prix in Toulouse, France. 

Raeisi and Kotturi, both working in the group of Dr. Eric Masson, constituted half of OHIO's nanocar design team, with post-doctorate fellow Dr. Karthikeyan Perumal, and graduate student Ramin Rabbani, also from the Masson group, being the other two chemists involved in the synthesis of the car.

Despite its incredibly small size, the Nanobobcat bears many features of a standard automobile. It has four wheels, axles, and a chassis. One of the real differences between it and an actual car is its molecular size, of course.

See Graduate Students Are Off to the Races in Nanocar Grand Prix.