Number 56 (Story #2), November 15, 1991 by Phillip F. Schewe and Ben Stein A NEW MICRO-CANTILEVER MECHANICAL AMPLIFIER developed at the IBM Almaden Research Center magnifies the motion of a small test mass by up to a factor of 100, before the mechanical motion is converted into an equivalent electrical signal by a transducer. This results in an increased sensitivity in the measurement of small forces. IBM researchers Dan Rugar and P. Grütter believe that this improvement may aid atomic-force microscopy and gravitational-wave detection (Physical Review Letters, 5 August 1991). They also report being able to achieve, for the first time, "thermomechanical noise squeezing," a process---analogous to "squeezed light"---in which the thermal vibration (Brownian motion) of the micro-cantilever is reduced, at least in one phase, to a level substantially less than is usually allowed at room temperature. (Physics World, November 1991.)