Micro Fork and Keystone
MEMS Precision Instruments
Welcome request New Design for specific applications.
The barbed Micro Fork has pulled the excised keystone out of the aerogel block, and
holds it securely so it can be transfered to any lab in the world for analysis, and study.
The Micro Fork is made from single crystal silicon. This Fork's tines are approximately
1 mm long, and have a tip of submicron sharpness. The Micro Fork provides a mechanical
interface that is macroscopic at one end, and microscopic at the other end. The macroscopic
end is big enough to be handled by human fingers. The microscopic end securely holds the
microscopic specimen.
The example specimen shown here is an aerogel keystone from NASA'S Stardust space capsule.
The aerogel material was used to capture high velocity particles from comet Wild 2.
The keystones are microscopic in mass and strength. The particles remain embedded in the
aerogel. The thin layer of aerogel is almost entirely empty pore space, so it does not
interfere significantly with study by X-ray, optical, electron beam, etc. The geometry of
the Fork holding
the object provides for convenient mounting, viewing the object on a positioning stage
allowing 360 degree rotation. The materials used in the Fork are silicon and pyrex, so it
can be used in air, liquid, vacuum, high temperature (up to 550 C) and low temperature (-273 C).
The Micro Fork can be located in any other environments for other applications. Other types
of objects could also be held by the Forks such as tiny biological, geological, or forensic
specimens, etc. A Micro Fork can hold the object indefinitly to be stored in permanent archive,
or continue in active study, or just simply get an object from one place then complete a release
procedure to remove the object from the Fork, then the object will located in another place.
The photo was taken at the NASA particle curation
lab at Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX, by Christopher Snead.
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