Liquidmetal Technologies Inc (LQMT)

[Watts Watt]

Here is a medical and computer chip application. Obviously, for the research to have already been done, Liquidmetal had to have ALREADY shipped them prototype "blanks" for them to practice machining upon:

http://www.plasticstoday.com/articles/metallic-glass-inserts-eyed-lab-chip-microfluidics0524201201

They also have significant potential to create injection mold inserts with nanoscale features.

In an article published in Materials Today, Michael Gilchrist, David Browne and colleagues at University College Dublin describe the potential for BMGs, which were discovered at CalTech about thirty years ago. They are a sophisticated brew of exotic metals which—if processed very carefully—form amorphous structures. Most metals have crystalline structures.

The amorphous structure means that BMGs can be injection molded like plastics and they can be machined with microscopic precision below the grain size of conventional metals. They also retain the strength and durability of normal metals.

Gilchrist and his colleagues showed how microscopic features can be machined on to the surface of a BMG. The tool steel typically used in molds cannot be machined with better than 10-micrometer precision because of its crystalline grain structure.

"Our technology is a new process for mass producing high-value polymer components, on the micrometer and nanometer-scale," says Gilchrist. "This is a process by which high-volume quantities of plastic components can be mass produced with one hundred times more precision, for costs that are at least ten times cheaper than currently possible."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/05/120522084518.htm

http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authored_newsitem.print/companynews05_02335?avoidEmail=true&printHome=cws_home

Conclusion:

It is amazing that phoney Hypsters will look at Apple release dates and try to create hype on rumors, but not look at the potential of Apple utilizing this technology for miniaturizing computer chips.

This is ALREADY happening today in IRELAND.

Duh...........is this a BREAKTHROUGH technology or WATT?

I wonder what Steipp is doing to protect our arses on this development?

Are they going to give this away, too, as Tony Chung would say?