Muscle 'machine'

French researchers have been able to assemble thousands of nanoparticles and activate them to coordinate movement like human muscle fibers.

A team of experts, led by Nicolas Giuseppone of the University of Strasbourg, said the experiment showed that nanotechnology has opened up a myriad of applications in the field of robotics and medicine, Artificial muscles.

Model of muscle movement machine

Human muscles are controlled by the coordinated motions of thousands of protein molecules called biological nanoparticles .

They operate independently at a distance of one nanometer. But when thousands of individuals combine, these molecules can amplify their movement lengthwise until they reach the level of synchronized activity in humans.

In the new study, Giuseppone's team has integrated a long strand of polymers, made from thousands of nanobots with the ability to move within a nanometer, according to Phys.Org.

When linked together, the entire polymer chain can shrink or expand by about 10 microns, which means that they have amplified upwards of 10,000 bytes, from one nanometer to 10 micrometers.