Phys.org February 15, 2022 Organic molecules consist of aromatic benzene rings, flat rings made up of six carbon atoms, which do not change properties or shape if subjected to electric potential. An international team of researchers (Sweden, Denmark) developed a successful formula to design anti-aromatic hydrocarbons made up of rings with eight carbon atoms. When bent into a tub-shape, it becomes more robust and can both receive and relay electrons. If two electrons are injected into it the hydrocarbon flattens and goes from insulating to conducting—a function like that of a transistor switching from 0 to 1. The combination of […]
Author Archives: Hema Viswanath
Researchers identify mechanism by which fatigue cracks grow
Phys.org February 16, 2022 Over the past century a succession of mechanisms has been hypothesized for structural failures resulting from prolonged low-amplitude loading. By atomistic modeling researchers at Cornell University have shown that sustained fatigue crack growth in vacuum requires emitted dislocations to change slip planes prior to their reabsorption into the crack on the opposite side of the loading cycle. By harnessing a new implementation of a concurrent multiscale method, they assess the validity of long-hypothesized material separation mechanisms thought to control near-threshold fatigue crack growth in vacuum and reconcile reports of crack growth in atomistic simulations at loading […]
Solar-powered system offers a route to inexpensive desalination
Science Daily February 14, 2022 Salt accumulation is one of the key bottlenecks for reliable solar evaporation techniques. An international team of researchers (USA – MIT, China) developed a wick-free layered system, with dark material at the top to absorb the sun’s heat, then a thin layer of water above a perforated layer of polyurethane, sitting atop a deep reservoir of the salty water such as a tank or a pond. Through calculations and experiments they determined the holes size in the polyurethane sheet to be 2.5 mm across for optimal convective circulation between the warmer upper layer of water […]
Squeezing the noise out of microscopes with quantum light
Nanowerk February 14, 2022 Quantum microscopy relies on extremely delicate control of light waves. However, its sensitivity is typically limited by optical losses. A team of researchers in the US (Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tulane University, MIT, University of Colorado) circumvented the problem with an entangled light called squeezed light, that is, the intensities of the light beams are correlated with each other at the quantum level resulting in noise reduction of up to 3 dB below the standard quantum limit. They minimized the photon backaction noise while taking advantage of quantum noise reduction by transducing the cantilever displacement signal […]
A star in the world of ceramic engineering
Science Daily February 10, 2022 A team of researchers in the US (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Bowdoin College, Harvard University) investigated the complex and highly ordered mineralized skeletal system of sea star from the tropical Indo-Pacific region. The skeleton consists of many millimeter-sized skeletal elements called ossicles which connect with soft tissue, allowing the animal to be flexible and move. Each ossicle is constructed of a microlattice structure so uniform that it can be described mathematically. They found that it is essentially a single crystal structure at atomic level which allows a sea star to reinforce its skeleton […]
Two-dimensional material could store quantum information at room temperature
Phys.org February 11, 2022 Spins in two-dimensional materials offer an advantage, as the reduced dimensionality enables feasible on-chip integration into devices. An international team of researchers (UK, Australia) has reported room-temperature optically detected magnetic resonance (ODMR) from single carbon-related defects in hexagonal boron nitride with up to 100 times stronger contrast than the ensemble average. They identified two distinct bunching timescales in the second-order intensity-correlation measurements for ODMR-active defects, but only one for those without an ODMR response. They observed either positive or negative ODMR signal for each defect. Based on kinematic models, they related this bipolarity to highly tunable […]
Top 10 Science and Technology Inventions for the Week of February, 11, 2022
01. Carbon nanotube films open up new prospects for electronics 02. Cooling matter from a distance 03. Nanowires under tension create the basis for ultrafast transistors 04. Scientists discover a mysterious transition in an electronic crystal 05. Scientists engineer new material that can absorb and release enormous amounts of energy 06. Study raises new possibilities for triggering room-temperature superconductivity with light 07. Super-elastic high-entropy Elinvar alloy discovered with potential for aerospace engineering 08. Tiny electrical vortexes bridge gap between ferroelectric and ferromagnetic materials 09. Towards self-sensing soft robots with electrochemically driven pumps 10. With a little help, new optical material […]
Carbon nanotube films open up new prospects for electronics
Nanowerk February 10, 2022 An international team of researchers (Russia, Finland) studied carbon nanotube films conductivity in the terahertz and infrared bands. Some of the films were made of nanotubes with lengths varying from 0.3 to 13 µm, while others were treated with oxygen plasma for 100 to 400 seconds and changed their electrodynamic properties in the process. They discovered that shortening tubes length (down to 0.3 µm) or exposing films to plasma (for longer than 100 s) leads to a drop in conductivity at low terahertz frequencies (< 0.3 THz). Exposure to plasma results in a larger number of […]
Cooling matter from a distance
Science Daily February 2, 2022 Researchers in Switzerland succeeded in forming a control loop consisting of two quantum systems separated by one meter. Within this loop a vibrating membrane was cooled by a cloud of atoms, and the two systems were coupled to one another by laser light. As one of the systems acts as a control unit for the other, no measurement is needed. Instead, the control system is configured to bring the target system into a desired state by means of coherent quantum mechanical interaction. They successfully used this coherent feedback mechanism to reduce the temperature of the […]
Hidden magnitude-8.2 earthquake source of mysterious 2021 global tsunami
Phys.org February 8, 2022 The 2021 August South Sandwich Island Mw 8.2 earthquake was a surprise, because it was initially reported as a magnitude 7.5 event at a deep depth (47 km) but generated a global-spreading tsunami that would only be expected for a larger and shallower event. By using seismic data researchers at Caltech revealed a hidden Mw 8.16 shallow slow event that happened between clusters of regular ruptures in the beginning and end. Although the slow event contributed 70% of the seismic moment, lasted three minutes, and ruptured a 200-km section of the plate interface, it is essentially […]