FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:                  Contact:  Mark Bello
Nov. 7, 1995                                      301) 975-3776
                                                  mark.bello@nist.gov

                             MEDIA ADVISORY

                           LEARN ABOUT NIST'S
                   UNIQUE MOLECULAR MEASURING MACHINE
                         AT NOV. 14 ROUNDTABLE

     Reporters are invited on Tuesday, Nov. 14, to inspect the world's
only "molecular measuring machine," a novel measurement tool built by
researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology to
help scientists and companies survey, subdivide and develop large tracts
of molecular terrain. Beginning at 9:30 a.m. in Lecture Room D in the
NIST Administration Building, a one-hour roundtable on the NIST M3 will
be followed by a tour of the laboratory that houses the unique
instrument.

     Now undergoing performance testing, M3 may do for the
still-uncharted molecular landscape what the sextant did centuries ago
for global navigation and exploration. Once it is operating over its
full range of 25 square centimeters, the experimental machine's field of
view will be 250,000 times larger than the 0.01 square-millimeter area
that the typical scanning tunneling microscope can scrutinize without
becoming disoriented. M3's anticipated capabilities are akin to being
able to locate two widely separated grains of sand in a 2,500
square-kilometer (960 square-mile) patch of desert and then measure the
distance between them to within one sand-grain diameter.

     The increasingly demanding measurement needs of the nation's
semiconductor industry are the mother of this NIST innovation. When
Clayton Teague, head of NIST's Nano-Scale Metrology Group, and his team
began work on M3 in 1987, they aimed to develop a machine that could
meet the U.S. microelectronics industry's most advanced measurement
requirements in the late 1990s. Since then, progress across the entire
expanse of the growing, commercially promising field of nanotechnology
has magnified the need for the exceptional measurement capabilities that
M3 aims to deliver.

     Teague and colleagues will describe the unique machine's
construction, operation and anticipated applications. Results of
measurements made during performance tests will be shown. A
question-and-answer session will follow. The briefing will conclude with
a tour of the M3 laboratory.

     Reporters who wish to attend the M3 briefing should reserve a spot
by contacting Mark Bello no later than noon on Monday, Nov. 13, at the
above phone number or e-mail address. NIST is located just off
Interstate Highway 270 North at the intersection of Rt. 124 (Quince
Orchard Rd.) and Rt. 117W (Clopper Rd.) in Gaithersburg, Md.

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