Single Trapped Atom Wins UK Science Photography Prize?

[DennisN]

Some very nice photos here:
Picture of Single Trapped Atom Wins UK Science Photography Prize (Gizmodo)

e.g.
A Strontium atom

Polymers.

 

[scottdave]

Those 2 "pencil lead" looking probes appear to only be maybe 10 atoms diameter (for the probe portion).

 

[Psinter]

I was going to say: "Whoa, that is one big atom", but then I checked the periodic table to confirm it is actually a big atom and that my eyes were not fooling me.

 

[f95toli]

I don't think the "atom" is anywhere near that big; traps of that type are quite big (look at the first photo in the link) and what you are really seeing is a diffuse "blob" which is the result of the ion scattering light; the apparent size will depend on the optics (I believe they typically use high NA microscope objectives) and the resolution of the detector. It has -as far as I am aware- nothing to do with the real size of the ion.

 

[lekh2003]

I'm not sure if many have heard of this, but a university student in the UK managed to take a picture of a single atom, using only a regular camera and a special high focus lens that would be able to capture the light to see the atom.

I think this a truly remarkable feat, as well as some of the other contestants' photos. Found out about it from this link: https://www.sciencealert.com/photo-of-a-single-trapped-atom-wins-uk-science-photo-prize

I find it more interesting that he has only used a regular camera to capture something as small as an atom. What are everybody's thoughts? What else do you think we might be able to see with "the naked camera"?

 

[Drakkith]

using only a regular camera and a special high focus lens

I didn't see anything about a high-focus lens (not even sure what that is) in the article. Looks to me like it was taken using long-exposure photography to capture the faint emissions of the atom.

I find it more interesting that he has only used a regular camera to capture something as small as an atom. What are everybody's thoughts? What else do you think we might be able to see with "the naked camera"?

To be fair, the image isn't quite as impressive as I thought it was going to be. The image of the atom is about like the image of a distant star. All you see is a point of light, as the angular diameter of the emitting object is far too small to see any details. Still, an impressive feat nonetheless.

 

[lekh2003]

I didn't see anything about a high-focus lens (not even sure what that is) in the article

He used a camera lens with a very large focal length, it was specialized, but the actual camera was regular.

Looks to me like it was taken using long-exposure photography to capture the faint emissions of the atom.

This combined with the special lens.

To be fair, the image isn't quite as impressive as I thought it was going to be. The image of the atom is about like the image of a distant star. All you see is a point of light, as the angular diameter of the emitting object is far too small to see any details. Still, an impressive feat nonetheless.

Same here. I thought it might be a little larger and clear. But using regular cameras and high-exposure settings, this is amazing.

 

[Drakkith]

He used a camera lens with a very large focal length, it was specialized, but the actual camera was regular.

I don't see any information on the lens used. Was it in the article, or somewhere else?

 

[lekh2003]

I don't see any information on the lens used. Was it in the article, or somewhere else?

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-02-14/atom-photo-taken-with-ordinary-camera/9445288 I read it here, sorry.

Apart from using a lens accessory that increases the focal length of an existing lens, much of the camera technology Mr Nadlinger used was simplistic.

 

[Drakkith]

Oh there's nothing special about the lens accessory he used, it's just a focal extender.

 

[lekh2003]

Oh there's nothing special about the lens accessory he used, it's just a focal extender.

Oh ok. Thanks for telling me that.

 

[jedishrfu]

Wow, this is like a whole new level of micro-management. Your boss will be able to observe and marshall every atom of your body using this relatively cheap camera setup.

 

[sophiecentaur]

Wow, this is like a whole new level of micro-management. Your boss will be able to observe and marshall every atom of your body using this relatively cheap camera setup.

Haha - if he has a long while to do it in.

 

[DennisN]

I'm not sure if many have heard of this, but a university student in the UK managed to take a picture of a single atom, using only a regular camera and a special high focus lens that would be able to capture the light to see the atom.

[..]

I find it more interesting that he has only used a regular camera to capture something as small as an atom. What are everybody's thoughts? What else do you think we might be able to see with "the naked camera"?

Hi, @lekh2003, I think you will also find these posts interesting:

• Hydrogen atom under magnification
• Electron microscopy
• Moving atoms & Atomic switch

from the thread What is the smallest particle which can be visually observed?

 

[DennisN]

Wow, this is like a whole new level of micro-management. Your boss will be able to observe and marshall every atom of your body using this relatively cheap camera setup.

Soon in an app for our smart phones: "Turn on/off notifications for when this atom changes state."

 

[Andy Resnick]

Some very nice photos here:

The second photo is an image of fluorescently counterstained cells- the nuclei are blue and microtubules (I guess they are polymers) are green. Not sure why the caption (on the website) says "Screening the different shapes of certain polymers", that's misleading.

 

[Andy Resnick]

I find it more interesting that he has only used a regular camera to capture something as small as an atom. What are everybody's thoughts? What else do you think we might be able to see with "the naked camera"?

Keep in mind that the image is not resolving the atom, what has been imaged is just the point-spread function. Just an Airy disc, same as imaging stars.

If you want to see truly impressive images, Nikon's "Small World" competition sets the bar:

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/photo

 

[lekh2003]

https://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/photo

Hi, @lekh2003, I think you will also find these posts interesting:

• Hydrogen atom under magnification
• Electron microscopy
• Moving atoms & Atomic switch

from the thread What is the smallest particle which can be visually observed?

These photos are absolutely beautiful. It's amazing how we can look at these objects which are always hidden from eyesight. It feels awesome.

 

[BillTre]

These photos are absolutely beautiful. It's amazing how we can look at these objects which are always hidden from eyesight. It feels awesome.

One of the benefits of being science aware!

 

[ElliotSmith]

Pretty cool!

https://qz.com/1205279/photo-of-an-atom-a-scientist-captured-an-incredible-photograph/

 

[ZapperZ]

I was cleaning up my external storage drive when I came across several SEM images that I took several years back. I decided to post this one here because it is rather self-explanatory, for most part.

This is an SEM image of a copper iris that was inside an RF cavity under very high RF field (I believe, up to 80 MV/m, if I remember it correctly). It didn't function properly, and when it was taken out, we saw pitted regions where we suspected arcing at occurred (RF vacuum breakdown). So I look at it closer under an SEM and noticed something quite fascinating that added to our body of knowledge of what went on during this breakdown event.

The picture show the region where I was focusing on, and if you look at the images, it look like water ripples coming out of a center. I saw this repeatedly at all the regions that I examined.

What we believed happened was that the bombardment of ionized gasses due to the arc had such a high energy that they melted the surface of the Cu, causing these "splash" patterns. These happened very quickly and over such a short time (at most, within half of the RF cycle, 100 picosecond time scale) that as soon as it was over, the melting stops and so the splash patterns are frozen.

It was fascinating to see many of these patterns in the pitted region of the iris.

This, BTW, is where my current avatar came from. :)

Zz.

 

[DennisN]

This is an SEM image of a copper iris that was inside an RF cavity under very high RF field

Fascinating image!

 

[DennisN]

Magnetic resonance imaging of single atoms on a surface:
(photo from the article World's smallest MRI performed on single atoms (nanowerk))

The bright areas mark positions where the atom's magnetic field is the same.
(Image: Philip Willke et al)

I posted about the new paper here in this thread, including an open access arxiv link.