Aug 24, 2022 (Nanowerk News) An international team of researchers led by Charles Cadieux, a Ph.D. student at the Université de Montréal and member of the Institute for Research on Exoplanets (iREx), has announced the discovery of TOI-1452 b, an exoplanet orbiting one of two small stars in a binary...
New platform speeds up design of lipid nanoparticles for gene medicine delivery
Aug 24, 2022 (Nanowerk News) The success of COVID-19 vaccines is a great example of gene medicine's tremendous potential to prevent viral infections. One reason for the vaccines' success is their use of lipid nanoparticles, or LNPs, to carry delicate messenger RNA to cells to generate and boost immunity. LNPs—tiny...
Novel smart material enables high-performance and reliable light control of droplets
Aug 24, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Manipulating droplet plays vital roles in fundamental research and practical applications from chemical reactions to bio-analysis. Light control of droplets enables remote and contactless control with remarkable spatial and temporal accuracy. However, high-performance and reliable light control of droplets is still challenging. Now, a research...
Biological nanofibrils can efficiently extract valuable metal elements from water
Aug 24, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Many valuable metals like Au, Ag, Li and U are vital to high technology and modern industry. The terrestrial mineral reserves of these metals are generally very limited or suffer from high mining cost. Although most of these valuable metal ions could be found in...
Damage-reporting and self-healing skin-like polymeric coatings
Aug 24, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Skin-like polymeric coatings are applied to the surfaces of automobiles, ships, and buildings to protect them from the external environment. As it is difficult to determine whether the currently used coatings are already damaged or not, these non-reusable coatings must be regularly replaced, leading to...
How nanotechnologies are shaping the future of warfare
Aug 23, 2022 (Nanowerk Spotlight) Throughout human history, technological progress has been inseparably intertwined with advances in military weaponry. Through the ages we can see how new inventions revolutionized both the living standards of society and the advancement of warfare technology. The Stone Age, Bronze Age and Iron Age led...
Defect-engineering MOFs for properties and performance
Aug 23, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Metal-organic framework (MOF) nanocrystals are hybrid materials, built from metal clusters and organic linkers with an almost unlimited number of possible combinations. Their properties and functions are determined by the way they are grown. The vast diversity of shapes and sizes of MOFs, and especially...
Microscopic color converters move small laser-based devices closer to reality
Aug 22, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Lasers are everywhere. Devices that use them transmit information and enable the existence of long-distance communications and the internet; they aid doctors performing surgeries and engineers manufacturing advanced tools and technologies; and day-to-day, we encounter lasers as we scan our groceries and watch DVDs. “In...
Researchers discover a material that can learn like the brain
Aug 22, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) researchers have discovered that Vanadium Dioxide (VO2), a compound used in electronics, is capable of “remembering” the entire history of previous external stimuli (Nature Electronics, "Electrical Control of Glass-like Dynamics in Vanadium Dioxide for Data Storage and Processing"). This...
Brushing thin films onto electrodes preserves batteries
Aug 22, 2022 (Nanowerk News) A bit of brushing may be the secret to making better rechargeable lithium batteries. The Rice University lab of chemist James Tour introduced a technique to tune the surface of anodes for batteries by simply brushing powders into them. The powder adheres to the anode...