Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) Which factors determine how fast a quantum computer can perform its calculations? Physicists at the University of Bonn and the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology have devised an elegant experiment to answer this question. The results of the study are published in the journal...
What makes an mRNA vaccine so effective against severe COVID-19?
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) The first two vaccines created with mRNA vaccine technology — the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines — are arguably two of the most effective COVID vaccines developed to date (read more: The revolutionary power of bio platforms – or why it took just 48 hours...
‘Pop-up’ electronic sensors could detect when individual heart cells misbehave
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a powerful new tool that monitors the electrical activity inside heart cells, using tiny “pop-up” sensors that poke into cells without damaging them. The device directly measures the movement and speed of electrical signals traveling...
Using magnets to toggle nanolasers leads to better photonics
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) A magnetic field can be used to switch nanolasers on and off, shows new research from Aalto University. The physics underlying this discovery paves the way for the development of optical signals that cannot be disturbed by external disruptions, leading to unprecedented robustness in signal...
Fueling the future with new perovskite-related oxide-ion conductors
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) The ever-increasing demand for clean energy and high-performance devices in the modern technological era has called for the development of alternate energy materials. In particular, oxide-ion conductors have garnered a lot of attention on this front. The presence of highly mobile oxide ions in their...
Controlled grabbing and rotation of biological micro-objects
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) We can test the quality and freshness of fruits and vegetables with our fingers, and even industrial robots have been performing successfully at tactile applications for years. But how is it possible to grab and rotate objects with the width of a human hair? Prof....
Researchers uncover the mechanism of electric field detection in microscale graphene sensors
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) The ability to sense the magnitude and polarity of the electric field is of great scientific interest. It has various real-life applications, such as early prediction of lightning and detection of supersonic aircraft. Presently, field mills are the widely used electric field sensors. While they...
Fabrication of flexible electronics improved using gold and water-vapor plasma
Dec 23, 2021 (Nanowerk News) Researchers at the RIKEN Center for Emergent Matter Science (CEMS) and the RIKEN Cluster for Pioneering Research (CPR) in Japan have developed a technique to improve the flexibility of ultra-thin electronics, such as those used in bendable devices or clothing. Published in Science Advances ("Direct...
New graphene-based neural probes improve detection of epileptic brain signals
Dec 22, 2021 (Nanowerk News) The ability to record and map the full range of brain signals using electrophysiological probes will greatly advance our understanding of brain diseases and aid the clinical management of patients with diverse neurological disorders. However, current technologies are limited in their ability to accurately obtain...
New technique tunes into graphene nanoribbons’ electronic potential
Dec 22, 2021 (Nanowerk News) Ever since graphene – a thin carbon sheet just one-atom thick – was discovered more than 15 years ago, the wonder material became a workhorse in materials science research. From this body of work, other researchers learned that slicing graphene along the edge of its...