Nanocars Racing

I don't think this made much news outside of the small community of STMers who looked at individual molecules' motions at surfaces. 

Nanocars racing seemed like a whimsical idea, a clever marketing idea. In actuality, it was a great way to bring synthetic chemists and scanning probe microscopists together to solve a problem: How do we design molecules that can be induced -- via the injection of electrons -- to travel long distances across a surface, in a controllable manner? 

There are also useful applications to molecular machines, such as one research lab that worked on the winning nanocar's publication showing molecular rotors piercing through a cell membrane when it is activated by light.

Link to article

Link to nanocars racing website