Cross-section of a fulgurite sample showing fused sand and melted conductor metal from a downed powerline. Credit: Luca Bindi et al. Topics: Condensed Matter Physics, Energy, Materials Science A team of researchers from Università di Firenze, the University of South Florida, California Institute of Technology, and Princeton University has found an incidence of a quasicrystalContinue reading “Serendipitous Quasicrystals…”
Category Archives: Materials Science
Pushing Beyond Moore…
Clean-room technicians at the AIM Photonics NanoTech chip fabrication facility in Albany, New York. Credit: SUNY Polytechnic Institute Topics: Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Materials Science, Nanotechnology, Semiconductor Technology Over 50 Years of Moore’s Law – Intel GAITHERSBURG, Md. — The U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has entered into a cooperativeContinue reading “Pushing Beyond Moore…”
OPVs…
V. ALTOUNIAN/SCIENCE Topics: Alternate Energy, Applied Physics, Chemistry, Materials Science, Solar Power As ultrathin organic solar cells hit new efficiency records, researchers see green energy potential in surprising places. In November 2021, while the municipal utility in Marburg, Germany, was performing scheduled maintenance on a hot water storage facility, engineers glued 18 solar panels toContinue reading “OPVs…”
Solar Lilly Pads…
Topics: Climate Change, Energy, Environment, Materials Science, Solar Power Leaf-like devices that are light enough to float on water could be used to generate fuel from solar farms located on open water sources. This avenue hasn’t been explored before, according to researchers from the University of Cambridge in the UK who developed them. The newContinue reading “Solar Lilly Pads…”
Solid-State Cooling…
Topics: Global Warming, Green Tech, Materials Science, Solid-State Physics, Thermodynamics Researchers in China have shown that applying strain to a composite material using an electric field induces a large and reversible caloric effect. This novel way of enhancing the caloric effect without a magnetic field could open new avenues of solid-state cooling and lead toContinue reading “Solid-State Cooling…”
Mirror, Mirror…
Topics: Applied Physics, Atomic-Scale Microscopy, Materials Science, Optics (Nanowerk News) When it goes online, the MAGIS-100 experiment at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and its successors will explore the nature of gravitational waves and search for certain kinds of wavelike dark matter. But first, researchers need to figure out something pretty basic: how to get good photographsContinue reading “Mirror, Mirror…”
Nanotubes and Nitro…
Topics: Carbon Nanotubes, Materials Science, Nanotechnology From TNT to nitro-glycerine, nitrogen-rich compounds are known for packing an explosive punch. When these materials explode, bonds between atoms in the compounds are broken, which gives a chance for two nitrogen atoms to form very strong triple bonds with each other. This releases an enormous amount of chemicalContinue reading “Nanotubes and Nitro…”
Getting Back Mojo…
Topics: Applied Physics, Lasers, Magnetism, Materials Science, Phonons When a magnetic material is bombarded with short pulses of laser light, it loses its magnetism within femtoseconds (10–15 seconds). The spin, or angular momentum, of the electrons in the material, thus disappears almost instantly. Yet all that angular momentum cannot simply be lost. It must be conservedContinue reading “Getting Back Mojo…”
Fantastic Plastic…
Topics: Artificial Intelligence, Biology, Computer Science, Materials Science Researchers in the US have developed a perovskite-based device that could be used to create a high-plasticity architecture for artificial intelligence. The team, led by Shriram Ramanathan at Purdue University, has shown that the material’s electronic properties can be easily reconfigured, allowing the devices to function like artificial neuronsContinue reading “Fantastic Plastic…”
Quantum AI…
Topics: Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science, Materials Science, Quantum Mechanics Quantum materials known as Mott insulators can “learn” to respond to external stimuli in a way that mimics animal behavior, say researchers at Rutgers University in the US. The discovery of behaviors such as habituation and sensitization in these non-living systems could lead to new algorithmsContinue reading “Quantum AI…”
Physics and Nano 