New research suggests insect wings might serve gyroscopic function

(March 18, 2015)  Gyroscopes measure rotation in everyday technologies, from unmanned aerial vehicles to cell phone screen stabilizers.

Though many animals can move with more precision and accuracy than our best-engineered aircraft and technologies, gyroscopes are rarely found in nature. Scientists know of just one group of insects, the group including flies, that has something that behaves like a gyroscope — sensors called halteres, clublike structures that evolved from wings.

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NTU and UC Berkeley develop remote-controlled cyborg beetle

(March 18, 2015)  Giant beetles potential alternative to remote-controlled drones

Breaking new grounds in the future of remote-controlled drone technology, Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and the University of California (UC) Berkeley, has jointly developed a living machine whose flight can be wirelessly controlled with minimal human intervention.

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Rice fine-tunes quantum dots from coal

Rice University scientists gain control of electronic, fluorescent properties of coal-based graphene

(March 18, 2015) Graphene quantum dots made from coal, introduced in 2013 by the Rice University lab of chemist James Tour, can be engineered for specific semiconducting properties in either of two single-step processes.

In a new study this week in the American Chemical Society journal Applied Materials & Interfaces, Tour and colleagues demonstrated fine control over the graphene oxide dots’ size-dependent band gap, the property that makes them semiconductors. Quantum dots are semiconducting materials that are small enough to exhibit quantum mechanical properties that only appear at the nanoscale.

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Empa-led EU project "TREASORES" yields first results

Towards "printed" organic solar cells and LEDs

(March 18, 2015)  Flexible optoelectronic devices that can be produced roll-to-roll – much like newspapers are printed – are a highly promising path to cheaper devices such as solar cells and LED lighting panels. Scientists from "TREASORES" project present  prototype flexible solar cell modules as well as novel silver-based transparent electrodes that outperform currently used materials.

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Caltech Scientists Develop Cool Process to Make Better Graphene

A new technique invented at Caltech to produce graphene—a material made up of an atom-thick layer of carbon—at room temperature could help pave the way for commercially feasible graphene-based solar cells and light-emitting diodes, large-panel displays, and flexible electronics.

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Light as Puppeteer

(March 18, 2015)  Researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST) have demonstrated a more robust method for controlling single, micron-sized particles with light.

Passing light along optical microfibers or nanofibers to manipulate particles has gained popularity in the past decade and has an array of promising applications in physics and biology. Most research has focused on using this technique with the basic profile of light, known as the fundamental mode.

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An Improved Method for Coating Gold Nanorods

(March 18, 2015)  Researchers have fine-tuned a technique for coating gold nanorods with silica shells, allowing engineers to create large quantities of the nanorods and giving them more control over the thickness of the shell. Gold nanorods are being investigated for use in a wide variety of biomedical applications, and this advance paves the way for more stable gold nanorods and for chemically functionalizing the surface of the shells.

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Graphene membrane could lead to better fuel cells, water filters

(March 17, 2015)  An atomically thin membrane with microscopically small holes may prove to be the basis for future hydrogen fuel cells, water filtering and desalination membranes, according to a group of 15 theorists and experimentalists, including three theoretical researchers from Penn State.

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Real-time holographic displays one step closer to reality

(March 16, 2015)  Researchers from the University of Cambridge have designed a new type of pixel element and demonstrated its unique switching capability, which could make three-dimensional holographic displays possible.

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Scientists move closer to “two for one deal” on solar cell efficiency

The causes of a hitherto mysterious process that could enhance the power of solar cells have been explained in a new study.

The underlying mechanism behind an enigmatic process called “singlet exciton fission”, which could enable the development of significantly more powerful solar cells, has been identified by scientists in a new study.

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Recalling memories may make us forget

(March 16, 2015)  Intentionally recalling memories may lead us to forget other competing experiences that interfere with retrieval, according to a study published today. In other words, the very act of remembering may be one of the major reasons why we forget.

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Nano piano's lullaby could mean storage breakthrough

Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have demonstrated the first-ever recording of optically encoded audio onto a non-magnetic plasmonic nanostructure, opening the door to multiple uses in informational processing and archival storage.

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Researchers Increase Energy Density of Lithium Storage Materials

Optimized Storage Principle and New Material Increase Lithium Storage Density in Batteries

(March 16, 2015)  An interdisciplinary team of researchers of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and KIT-founded Helmholtz Institute Ulm (HIU) pushes the further development of lithium ion batteries: The researchers developed a new cathode material based on a new storage principle, as a result of which energy storage densities can be increased beyond those of systems known so far. The researchers now present the new material in the journal “Advanced Energy Materials”.

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A better method for making perovskite solar cells

(March 16, 2015)  Researchers at Brown University have developed a new method for making solar cells from perovskite — a faster, more straightforward method that can produce flexible, high-efficiency, thinner cells.

Research led by a Brown University Ph.D. student has revealed a new way to make light-absorbing perovskite films for use in solar cells.

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Symmetry matters in graphene growth

Rice researchers find subtle interactions with substrate may lead to better control

(March 16, 2015) What lies beneath growing islands of graphene is important to its properties, according to a new study led by Rice University.

Scientists at Rice analyzed patterns of graphene – a single-atom-thick sheet of carbon – grown in a furnace via chemical vapor deposition. They discovered that the geometric relationship between graphene and the substrate, the underlying material on which carbon assembles atom by atom, determines how the island shapes emerge.

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Two languages, two minds: Flexible cognitive processing driven by language of operation

Abstract

We make sense of objects and events around us by classifying them into identifiable categories. The extent to which language affects this process has been the focus of a long-standing debate: Do different languages cause their speakers to behave differently? Here, we show that fluent German-English bilinguals categorize motion events according to the grammatical constraints of the language in which they operate. First, as predicted from cross-linguistic differences in motion encoding, participants functioning in a German testing context prefer to match events on the basis of motion completion to a greater extent than participants in an English context. Second, when participants suffer verbal interference in English, their categorization behavior is congruent with that predicted for German and when we switch the language of interference to German, their categorization becomes congruent with that predicted for English. These findings show that language effects on cognition are context-bound and transient, revealing unprecedented levels of malleability in human cognition.

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journal reference (Psychological Science) >> 

PPPL and General Atomics scientists make breakthrough in understanding how to control intense heat bursts in fusion experiments

(March 13, 2015)  Researchers from General Atomics and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) have made a major breakthrough in understanding how potentially damaging heat bursts inside a fusion reactor can be controlled. Scientists performed the experiments on the DIII-D National Fusion Facility, a tokamak operated by General Atomics in San Diego. The findings represent a key step in predicting how to control heat bursts in future fusion facilities including ITER, an international experiment under construction in France to demonstrate the feasibility of fusion energy. This work is supported by the DOE Office of Science (Fusion Energy Sciences).

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Copenhagen chemists discover an unlikely connection

(March 13, 2015) As with magnets and alternating current, positively charged molecules never aim for one another. Indeed, similarly charged atoms are repelled. Nevertheless, a team from the University of Copenhagen’s Department of Chemistry has managed to become the first to bond positively charged phosphorus atoms with positively charged hydrogen ones. Their insight may prove pivotal to understanding how biologically important molecules such as DNA and proteins form properly.

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World Reputation Rankings 2015 results announced

View the full World Reputation Rankings 2015 top 100 >>

(March 13, 2015)  The UK has increased its share of institutions in a global ranking of the world’s most prestigious universities.

The results of the Times Higher Education World Reputation Rankings 2015 show that the UK now boasts 12 of the 100 most renowned higher education institutions in the world (up from 10 last year), while its two strongest performers, the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge, have improved their positions.

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How does order emerge?

Scientists from the MPQ, LMU, and the FUB analyse how fast order can appear in a quantum-mechanical system.

During the freezing of water, the initially unordered molecules start to form an ordered crystal, namely ice. During this phase transition, they rearrange from an unordered into a more ordered state. This setting naturally poses one important question: How long does this phase transition take, i.e. how long does it take for each molecule to find its place in the crystal? The answer to this and similar questions has important consequences in e.g. metallurgy, since the size of the resulting crystal grains plays a major role in determining the elasticity or brittleness of steel. While these questions have been studied extensively for classical systems, they are relatively unexplored in the context of quantum systems.

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Magnetic brain stimulation

(March 12, 2015)  New technique could lead to long-lasting localized stimulation of brain tissue without external connections.

Researchers at MIT have developed a method to stimulate brain tissue using external magnetic fields and injected magnetic nanoparticles — a technique allowing direct stimulation of neurons, which could be an effective treatment for a variety of neurological diseases, without the need for implants or external connections.

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You Are When You Eat

If you’re looking to improve your heart health by changing your diet, when you eat may be just as important as what you eat. In a new study published today in Science, researchers at San Diego State University and the Salk Institute for Biological Studies found that by limiting the time span during which fruit flies could eat, they could prevent aging- and diet-related heart problems. The researchers also discovered that genes responsible for the body's circadian rhythm are integral to this process, but they're not yet sure how.

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3D Printer for Small Molecules Opens Access to Customized Chemistry

(March 12, 2015)  3D Printer for Small Molecules Opens Access to Customized Chemistry HHMI scientists have designed a revolutionary "3D printer" for small molecules that could open the power of customized chemistry to many.  Howard Hughes Medical Institute scientists have simplified the chemical synthesis of small molecules, eliminating a major bottleneck that limits the exploration of a class of compounds offering tremendous potential for medicine and technology. 

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Deadly to cancer cells only: A molecular cause for selective effectiveness of parvovirus therapy discovered

(March 12, 2015) Parvoviruses can destroy cancer cells and are currently being tested in a preliminary clinical trial to treat malignant brain cancer. For their replication, the viruses need a particular enzyme in the cell. Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have now discovered that in healthy human cells, parvoviruses are unable to activate this enzyme. In many cases of malignant brain cancer, however, the enzyme is permanently active. As a result, this enables the viruses to replicate and to destroy the cancer cells. It accounts not only for the viruses' natural selectivity for cancer cells but also helps identify cancer patients who might benefit from parvovirus therapy.

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CT scanning shows why tilting trees produce better biofuel

(March 12, 2015) Imperial researchers have used medical imaging techniques to explore why making willow trees grow at an angle can vastly improve their biofuel yields.

Using micro-CT scans, the team showed that the trees respond to being tilted by producing a sugar-rich, gelatinous fibre, which helps them stay upright.

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Researchers develop ‘visual Turing test’

(March 12, 2015) Computers are able to recognize objects in in photographs and other images, but how well can they “understand” the relationships or implied activities between objects? Researchers have devised a method of evaluating how well computers perform at that task.

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Silk could be new ‘green’ material for next-generation batteries

(March 12, 2015) Lithium-ion batteries have enabled many of today’s electronics, from portable gadgets to electric cars. But much to the frustration of consumers, none of these batteries last long without a recharge. Now scientists report in the journal ACS Nano the development of a new, “green” way to boost the performance of these batteries — with a material derived from silk.

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How 3-D bioprinting could address the shortage of organ donations

(March 12, 2015) Three-dimensional bioprinting has come a long way since its early days when a bioengineer replaced the ink in his desktop printer with living cells. Scientists have since successfully printed small patches of tissue. Could it someday allow us to custom-print human organs for patients in need of transplants? An article in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, explores the possibility.

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Advances in Understanding Plants’ Immune Systems Could Lead to Better Tomatoes, Roses, Rice and Soybeans

(March 12, 2015)  Spring is just around the corner and for millions of Americans, that means planting a garden with plenty of fruits and vegetables, including tomatoes. However, some of the plants will be infected by bacteria, leading to stunted growth and less nutritional value. Now, a University of Missouri research team has uncovered new regulations of defense pathways for plants. This discovery could lead to helping those home-grown tomatoes fight off certain bacteria better and has implications for pear trees, roses, soybeans and rice.

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New material captures carbon at half the energy cost

(March 12, 2015) UC Berkeley chemists have made a major leap forward in carbon-capture technology with a material that can efficiently remove carbon from the ambient air of a submarine as readily as from the polluted emissions of a coal-fired power plant.

The material then releases the carbon dioxide at lower temperatures than current carbon-capture materials, potentially cutting by half or more the energy currently consumed in the process. The released CO2 can then be injected underground, a technique called sequestering, or, in the case of a submarine, expelled into the sea.

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Bioelectrochemical processes have the potential to one day replace petrochemistry

Lysine production as an example shows potential savings

(March 9, 2015)  Researchers at Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research (UFZ), Germany, and the University of Queensland (UQ), Australia, have found that the electrification of the white biotechnology is not merely a green dream, but an alternative to petrochemistry with realistic economical potential. Compared to classical sugar based bio-processes, bioelectrochemical processes promise improved yields, which could turn out to be a real game changer. The next generation of bio-production facilities may not only become more environmentally friendly, but also more economically competitive, a conclusion drawn jointly by scientists at UFZ and the UQ. In a recently published study in the scientific journal ChemSusChem, the researchers analysed for the first time the economical potential of this new technology using the example of an existing bio-process.

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Quantum mechanic frequency filter for atomic clocks

(March 9, 2015)  Atomic clocks are the most accurate clocks in the world. In an atomic clock, electrons jumping from one orbit to another decides the clock’s frequency. To get the electrons to jump, researchers shine light on the atoms using stabilised laser light. However, the laser light has to have a very precise frequency to trigger very precise electron jumps. It is however challenging to get the laser light frequency ultra precise – there will always be a little ‘noise’. Now researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute have developed a method that reduces the noise so that it is up to 100 times quieter.

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NIST Gets New Angle on X-Ray Measurements

(March 9, 2015)  Criminal justice, cosmology and computer manufacturing may not look to have much in common, but these and many other disparate fields all depend on sensitive measurements of X-rays. Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a new method* to reduce uncertainty in X-ray wavelength measurement that could provide improvements awaited for decades.

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Test Rig for Commercial Vehicles: Efficient Operation of Air Conditioning Systems

KIT Scientists Develop New Operation Strategies for Efficient Air Conditioning of Vehicles. New Test Rig Saves Time and Costs

Truck drivers are at the wheel for up to ten hours a day. A comfortable climate in the driver’s cab is of decisive importance to the driver’s performance and driving safety. However, air conditioning systems may increase fuel consumption by up to ten percent depending on the type of vehicle, the type of air conditioning system, and the operation conditions. Scientists of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) therefore develop more efficient operation strategies. To test these strategies under realistic conditions with a reasonable time and cost expenditure, they designed a new test rig.

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Graphene Meets Heat Waves

(March 6, 2015)  EPFL researchers have shed new light on the fundamental mechanisms of heat dissipation in graphene and other two-dimensional materials. They have shown that heat can propagate as a wave over very long distances. This is key information for engineering the electronics of tomorrow.

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ORNL microscopy directly images problematic lithium dendrites in batteries

(March 6, 2015)  Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have captured the first real-time nanoscale images of lithium dendrite structures known to degrade lithium-ion batteries. The ORNL team’s electron microscopy could help researchers address long-standing issues related to battery performance and safety.

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Squeezing out new science from material interfaces

(March 6, 2015)  With more than five times the thermal conductivity of copper, diamond is the ultimate heat spreader. But the slow rate of heat flow into diamond from other materials limits its use in practice. In particular, the physical process controlling heat flow between metals and diamond has remained a mystery to scientists for many years.

By applying extreme pressure in a diamond anvil cell to metal films on diamond, researchers at Illinois have now determined the physical process dominating this unexplained heat flow, which has implications for understanding and improving heat flow between any two materials.

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Solar Cells Get Growth Boost

(March 4, 2015) Researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University's (OIST) Energy Materials and Surface Sciences Unit have found that growing a type of film used to manufacture solar cells in ambient air gives it a growth boost. The finding, which could make manufacturing solar cells significantly cheaper, was published in Chemistry of Materials.

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Kids and robots learn to write together

(March 4, 2015)  Who is the teacher: the student or the machine? By showing a robot how to write letters, children improve their writing skills and gain self-­‐confidence. This system, called CoWriter, was developed by EPFL researchers.

A little girl lines up plastic letters fitted with QR codes in front of a little humanoid robot. The robot struggles to reproduce them on a tablet – especially the loop of the letter p. The girl kindly steps in to help, writing out the word to show the robot how to do it. She puts in effort to teach the robot... without realizing that in reality she is the one who is improving her writing skills. Yesterday, EPFL researchers presented their new teaching tool, called CoWriter, at the "Conference on Human-­‐Robot Interaction (HRI)", an important event in the field of interactive robotics, held in Portland, USA.

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Energy-generating cloth could replace batteries in wearable devices

(March 4, 2015)  From light-up shoes to smart watches, wearable electronics are gaining traction among consumers, but these gadgets’ versatility is still held back by the stiff, short-lived batteries that are required. These limitations, however, could soon be overcome. In the journal ACS Nano, scientists report the first durable, flexible cloth that harnesses human motion to generate energy. It can also self-charge batteries or supercapacitors without an external power source and make new commercial and medical applications possible.

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Goodyear Concept Tires Offer a Glimpse of the Future

Visionary tire technologies showcased at Geneva Motor Show

(March 3, 2015)  Two groundbreaking concept tires unveiled by The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company at this week’s 85th Geneva International Motor Show could radically change the role of car tires in the future.

Though the two tires are concept products, the futuristic technologies stretch the imagination and provide a glimpse of what practical innovations may be on the horizon.

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The first ever photograph of light as both a particle and wave

(March 2, 2015)  Light behaves both as a particle and as a wave. Since the days of Einstein, scientists have been trying to directly observe both of these aspects of light at the same time. Now, scientists at EPFL have succeeded in capturing the first-ever snapshot of this dual behavior.

Quantum mechanics tells us that light can behave simultaneously as a particle or a wave. However, there has never been an experiment able to capture both natures of light at the same time; the closest we have come is seeing either wave or particle, but always at different times. Taking a radically different experimental approach, EPFL scientists have now been able to take the first ever snapshot of light behaving both as a wave and as a particle. The breakthrough work is published in Nature Communications.

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Researchers discover milk protein enables survival of the species

(March 2, 2015)  Australian researchers have discovered the protein MCL-1 is critical for keeping milk-producing cells alive and sustaining milk production in the breast. Without milk production, offspring cannot survive, making MCL-1 essential for survival of mammalian species.

Dr Nai Yang Fu, Professor Geoff Lindeman and Professor Jane Visvader from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute led the research, published today in the journal Nature Cell Biology.

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Chemists at Bielefeld University develop anti-tumour agent

Chemists at Bielefeld University have developed a molecule containing copper that binds specifically with DNA and prevents the spread of cancer. First results show that it kills the cancer cells more quickly than cisplatin – a widely used anti-cancer drug that is frequently administered in chemotherapy. When developing the anti-tumour agent, Professor Dr. Thorsten Glaser and his team cooperated with biochemists and physicists. The design of the new agent is basic research. ‘How and whether the copper complex will actually be given to cancer patients is something that medical research will have to determine in the years to come,’ says the chemist.

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Aerogel catalyst shows promise for fuel cells

Rice University scientists turn unzipped nanotubes into possible alternative for platinum

(March 2, 2015)  Graphene nanoribbons formed into a three-dimensional aerogel and enhanced with boron and nitrogen are excellent catalysts for fuel cells, even in comparison to platinum, according to Rice University researchers.

A team led by materials scientist Pulickel Ajayan and chemist James Tour made metal-free aerogels from graphene nanoribbons and various levels of boron and nitrogen to test their electrochemical properties. In tests involving half of the catalytic reaction that takes place in fuel cells, they discovered versions with about 10 percent boron and nitrogen were efficient in catalyzing what’s known as an oxygen reduction reaction, a step in producing energy from feedstocks like methanol.

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IMPORTANT STEP TOWARDS QUANTUM COMPUTING: METALS AT ATOMIC SCALE

(March 2, 2015)  In the latest issue of the journal Nature Physics, German Scientists report that they could observe experimentally the current flow along channels at the crystal surfaces of topological insulators. The channels are less than one nanometer wide and extend along atomic steps of the crystal lattice. The scientists demonstrated also how these steps can be introduced in any arrangement.

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Supersonic electrons could produce future solar fuel

(March 2, 2015) Researchers from institutions including Lund University have taken a step closer to producing solar fuel using artificial photosynthesis. In a new study, they have successfully tracked the electrons’ rapid transit through a light-converting molecule.

The ultimate aim of the present study is to find a way to make fuel from water using sunlight. This is what photosynthesis does all the time – plants convert water and carbon dioxide to energy rich molecules using sunlight. Researchers around the world are therefore attempting to borrow ideas from photosynthesis in order to find a way to produce solar fuel artificially.

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journal reference (Open Access) >>

Google Glass Shows Promising Uses in Plastic Surgery, Reports Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery

(March 2, 2015) The "wearable technology" Google Glass has a wide range of possible applications in plastic surgery—with the potential to enhance surgical training, medical documentation, and patient safety, according to a special paper in the March 2015 issue of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery®, the official medical journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS).

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Black phosphorus is new ‘wonder material’ for improving optical communication

(March 2, 2015)  Phosphorus, a highly reactive element commonly found in match heads, tracer bullets, and fertilizers, can be turned into a stable crystalline form known as black phosphorus. In a new study, researchers from the University of Minnesota used an ultrathin black phosphorus film  —only 20 layers of atoms— to demonstrate high-speed data communication on nanoscale optical circuits.

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Pens filled with high-tech inks for Do It Yourself sensors

(March 2, 2015) A new simple tool developed by nanoengineers  at the University of California, San Diego, is opening the door to an era when anyone will be able to build sensors, anywhere, including physicians in the clinic, patients in their home and soldiers in the field. The team from the University of California, San Diego, developed high-tech bio-inks that react with several chemicals, including glucose. They filled off-the-shelf ballpoint pens with the inks and were able to draw sensors to measure glucose directly on the skin and sensors to measure pollution on leaves.

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