Shrinking scaffolding creates nanoscale 3D objects of any shape

Producing three-dimensional objects at very small scales with precision has often been a difficulty for engineers. Especially in the medical devices field, such objects could have great utility, but while two-dimensional patterns can be etched with precision by lasers, 3D nanostructures are more difficult; additive techniques are slow and challenging and also limited to specialised materials. Moreover, they can only make self-supporting structures – linked chains and hollow spheres are not possible.

The MIT team, led by biological engineer Edward Boyden, who is also attached to the McGovern Institute for Brain Research and the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, turned to a technique which relies on shrinking a premade scaffold structure. While shrinking has long been a staple of science fiction films from The Incredible Shrinking Man to Fantastic Voyage and more recently Ant Man, Boyden’s technique is more prosaic and grounded in reality.

In a paper in Science, Boyden, Adam marble stone and graduate students Daniel Oran and Samuel Rodriques describe technique adapted from a method Boyden’s lab developed for high-resolution imaging of brain tissue. Known as expansion microscopy, this involves embedding tissue to hydrogel and expanding it so they can be studied with a regular bench-top optical microscope.