Nano News: May 2015

New 'designer carbon' boosts battery performance

Stanford University scientists have created a new carbon material that significantly boosts the performance of energy-storage technologies. Their results are featured on the cover of the journal ("Ultrahigh Surface Area Three-Dimensional Porous Graphitic Carbon from Conjugated Polymeric Molecular Framework"). A new 'designer carbon' invented by Stanford...

Beyond crystallography: Diffractive imaging using coherent x-ray light sources

In 1999, UCLA professor John Miao pioneered a technique called coherent diffractive imaging, or CDI, which allows scientists to re-create the 3D structure of noncrystalline samples or nanocrystals. The achievement was extremely significant because although X-ray crystallography had long allowed scientists...

Even steps to quantum computation

Electrons are normally free to move through a solid in all three dimensions. Restricting their motion to a two-dimensional surface can, however, radically alter the properties of the material. A RIKEN-led team has now created a two-dimensional system that displays an exotic physical effect that could be useful for quantum computing (, "Even-denominator...

Physicists conduct most precise measurement yet of interaction between atoms and carbon surfaces

Physicists at the University of Washington have conducted the most precise and controlled measurements yet of the interaction between the atoms and molecules that comprise air and the type of carbon surface used in battery electrodes and air filters — key information for improving those technologies. A team led by David Cobden, UW professor of physics,...

Breakthrough heralds super-efficient light-based computers

Stanford electrical engineer Jelena Vuckovic wants to make computers faster and more efficient by reinventing how they send data back and forth between chips, where the work is done. In computers today, data is pushed through wires as a stream of electrons. That takes a lot of power, which helps explain why laptops get so warm. "Several years ago,...

Chemists discover key reaction mechanism behind the highly touted sodium-oxygen battery

Chemists at the University of Waterloo have discovered the key reaction that takes place in sodium-air batteries that could pave the way for development of the so-called holy grail of electrochemical energy storage. Researchers from the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology, led by Professor Linda Nazar who holds the Canada Research Chair in Solid...

Linking superconductivity and structure

Superconductivity is a rare physical state in which matter is able to conduct electricity--maintain a flow of electrons--without any resistance. It can only be found in certain materials, and even then it can only be achieved under controlled conditions of low temperatures and high pressures. New research from a team including Carnegie's Elissaios...

Experiments in the realm of the impossible

Physicists of Jena University (Germany) simulate for the first time charged Majorana particles – elementary particles, which are not supposed to exist. In the new edition of the science magazine ("Optical simulation of charge conservation violation and Majorana dynamics") they explain their approach: Professor Dr. Alexander Szameit and his team developed...

Seeing the action involved in cell membrane hemifusion

Cells are biological wonders. Throughout billions of years of existence on Earth, these tiny units of life have evolved to collaborate at the smallest levels in promoting, preserving and protecting the organism they comprise. Among these functions is the transport of lipids and other biomacromolecules between cells via membrane adhesion and fusion...

Nanotechnology identifies brain tumor types through MRI 'virtual biopsy'

Biomedical researchers at Cedars-Sinai have invented a tiny drug-delivery system that can identify cancer cell types in the brain through “virtual biopsies” and then attack the molecular structure of the disease. If laboratory research with mice is borne out in human studies, the results could be used to deliver nano-scale drugs that can distinguish...

Computational physicists advance understanding of electrical vortices in certain materials

Computational physicists have developed a novel method that accurately reveals how electrical vortices affect electronic properties of materials that are used in a wide range of applications, including cell phones and military sonar. Zhigang Gui, a doctoral student in physics at the University of Arkansas, and Laurent Bellaiche, Distinguished Professor...

A new formulation of quantum mechanics

Quantum mechanics remains one of the most tested theory in the history of physics and yet it represents one of the most challenging theory human kind has come up with. While the Schrödinger formulation is the de-facto standard, describing systems in terms of wave-functions, it is certainly not the only...

DNA double helix does double duty in assembling arrays of nanoparticles

In a new twist on the use of DNA in nanoscale construction, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory and collaborators put synthetic strands of the biological material to work in two ways: They used ropelike configurations of the DNA double helix to form a rigid geometrical framework, and added dangling pieces...

Engineering phase changes in nanoparticle arrays

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have just taken a big step toward the goal of engineering dynamic nanomaterials whose structure and associated properties can be switched on demand. In a paper appearing in ("Selective transformations between nanoparticle superlattices via the reprogramming of DNA-mediated...

Table-top extreme UV laser system heralds imaging at the nanoscale

Researchers at Swinburne University of Technology have discovered a new way to generate bright beams of coherent extreme UV radiation using a table-top setup that could be used to produce high resolution images of tiny structures at the nanoscale. “The ability to image nano-scale features with a conventional optical microscope is limited by the wavelength...

Nanostructures increase corrosion resistance in metallic body implants

Researchers studied the corrosion and immunity behavior of a new type of nanostructures and used them in the production of metallic body implants (, "Effect of Equal Channel Angular Pressing Process on the Corrosion Behavior of Type 316L Stainless Steel in Ringer's Solution"). Corrosion behavior of...

Nonfriction literature

$500 billion. That's a low estimate of how much friction and wear costs the U.S. every year. In fact, studies suggest that so-called "normal wear and tear" costs industrialized countries some 2 to 6 percent of their annual gross domestic product. How so? Nearly every machine ever created has at least one performance-critical sliding interface. Joints,...

Atomic-level flyovers show how radiation bombardment boosts superconductivity

Sometimes a little damage can do a lot of good -- at least in the case of iron-based high-temperature superconductors. Bombarding these materials with high-energy heavy ions introduces nanometer-scale damage tracks that can enhance the materials' ability to carry high current with no energy loss -- and without lowering the critical operating temperature....

UCF's new nanotechnology Master's degree is first in Florida

The University of Central Florida (UCF) is now the first and only university in Florida to offer a research-focused master’s degree in nanoscience. The Master of Science in Nanotechnology program further elevates the prominence of UCF’s nanotechnology research, said Sudipta Seal, director of the university’s...

Artificial muscles get graphene boost

Ionic polymer metal composites (IPMCs), often referred to as artificial muscles, are electro-active polymer actuators that change in size or shape when stimulated by an electric field. IPMCs have been extensively investigated for their potential use in robotics inspired by nature, such as underwater vehicles propelled by fish-like fins, and in rehabilitation...

Mission possible: This device will self-destruct when heated

Where do electronics go when they die? Most devices are laid to eternal rest in landfills. But what if they just dissolved away, or broke down to their molecular components so that the material could be recycled? University of Illinois researchers have developed heat-triggered self-destructing electronic devices, a step toward greatly reducing electronic...

New software allows simulation of molecular dynamics in large systems

Image: T. Mori (Theoretical Molecular Science Laboratory) This software promises to open a new era in computational biophysics and biochemistry by allowing scientists to make connections between molecular and cellular-level understanding and to integrate experimental knowledge with theoretical and computational insights. Although other programs are...

Nanowerk Nanotechnology Research News

http://bit.ly/1K2oLEc Nanotechnology Nanotechnology research news headlines from Nanowerk Copyright Nanowerk LLC http://bit.ly/1K2oLEc http://bit.ly/1HafTcb en-us Mon, 11 May 2015 14:56:39 -0400 http://bit.ly/1HafRkt Scientists have successfully visualized anisotropic carrier motion by using time-resolved microscopic optical second-harmonic generation...

First theoretical proof: Measurement of a single nuclear spin in biological samples

Physicists of the University of Basel and the Swiss Nanoscience Institute were able to show for the first time that the nuclear spins of single molecules can be detected with the help of magnetic particles at room temperature. In ("High-efficiency resonant amplification of weak magnetic fields for single...

Curcumin nanodrug breaks cancers' resistance to treatment

Researchers from Cancer Research Center of Tehran University of Medical Sciences produced biocompatible and biodegradable non-ionic polymeric nanocarriers that can be used in the targeted anticancer drug delivery (, "Encapsulation of Curcumin in Diblock Copolymer Micelles for Cancer Therapy"). The nanocarrier...