Jan 17, 2025 (Nanowerk News) A flash of light traps this material in an excited state indefinitely, and new experiments reveal how it happens. A dry material makes a great fire starter, and a soft material lends itself to a sweater. Batteries require materials that can store lots of energy,...
‘Brand new physics’ for next generation spintronics
Jan 17, 2025 (Nanowerk News) Our data-driven world demands more—more capacity, more efficiency, more computing power. To meet society’s insatiable need for electronic speed, physicists have been pushing the burgeoning field of spintronics. Traditional electronics use the charge of electrons to encode, store and transmit information. Spintronic devices utilize both...
Autonomous AI assistant to build nanostructures
Jan 16, 2025 (Nanowerk News) The chemical composition of a material alone sometimes reveals little about its properties. The decisive factor is often the arrangement of the molecules in the atomic lattice structure or on the surface of the material. Materials science utilises this factor to create certain properties by...
New chainmail-like 2D material could be the future of armor
Jan 16, 2025 (Nanowerk News) In a remarkable feat of chemistry, a Northwestern University-led research team has developed the first two-dimensional (2D) mechanically interlocked material. Resembling the interlocking links in chainmail, the nanoscale material exhibits exceptional flexibility and strength. With further work, it holds promise for use in high-performance, light-weight...
Paper-thin optical lenses have a bright future
Jan 16, 2025 (Nanowerk News) Paper-thin optical lenses simple enough to mass produce like microchips could enable a new generation of compact optical devices. A team with researchers at the University of Tokyo and JSR Corp. fabricated and tested flat lenses called Fresnel zone plates (FZPs), but did so for...
A deep learning pipeline for controlling protein interactions
Jan 16, 2025 (Nanowerk News) In 2023, scientists in the joint School of Engineering and School of Life Sciences Laboratory of Protein Design and Immunoengineering (LPDI), led by Bruno Correia, published in Nature ("De novo design of protein interactions with learned surface fingerprints") a deep-learning pipeline for designing new proteins...
Watching the oscillations of an electron sea
Jan 16, 2025 (Nanowerk News) Imagine standing by a lake and throwing a stone into the water. Waves spread out in circular patterns and can reflect at obstacles and boundaries. Researchers at the University of Regensburg, in collaboration with colleagues from Milan and Pisa, have recreated this everyday phenomenon in...
Scientists create tiny motors that mimic nature
Jan 16, 2025 (Nanowerk News) Scientists have built an artificial motor capable of mimicking the natural mechanisms that power life. Just like the proteins in our muscles, which convert chemical energy into power to allow us to perform daily tasks, these tiny rotary motors use chemical energy to generate force,...
Graphene made permeable for ions
Jan 15, 2025 (Nanowerk News) A milestone in graphene research: Würzburg chemists have succeeded in controlling the passage of halide ions by deliberately introducing defects into a two-layer nanographene system. Their results have been published in Nature ("Bilayer nanographene reveals halide permeation through a benzene hole"). The paper shows new...
Ultra-compact, high-speed alignment system for industrial PIC test and assembly
Jan 15, 2025 (Nanowerk News) PI's new F-141 photonics alignment system provides high throughput with motion in 4 and 6 degrees of freedom for industrial test and assembly of photonic integrated circuits (PIC). This ultra-compact precision alignment system fits inside a space of ~5x7x4 inches (WxLxH) while providing 40mm of...