Solid-state nanopores are of great interest as developers hope to use the structures to characterize biopolymers, such as DNA, RNA and polypeptides. Within the highly confined space of a nanopore, down to a few nanometres, molecules can be detected by a variety of means. Now, besides tuning the size of the nanopore, researchers have deformed Si3N4 nanopores into many other geometries, including nanoslits and nanostars, using a high-energy convergent electron beam (CEB) in a high-resolution transmission electron microscope (TEM).
http://nanotechweb.org/cws/article/lab/45427