New Levitation Technique Allows 'Touchless' Chemical Reactions

When we think of levitation, most of us think of magic tricks and movies. In the lab, however, research is being carried out on methods of levitation that allow droplets of liquid to be suspended in midair, allowing for contact-free experiments without containers or handling that might affect the outcome.

A team has just reported in a paper published, in the American Chemical Society's journal Analytical Chemistry, that they have developed a method that can do just that.

Though researchers have long been trying to develop a levitation method for experiments, mixing the droplets and observing their reactions has been challenging. The team that has just revealed the findings of their research, claims to allow researchers to use this potentially groundbreaking method in a laboratory, a press release explains.