EurekAlert December 28, 2020 Using the adiabatic quantum-flux-parametron (AQFP), as a building block researchers in Japan have developed and demonstrated a prototype 4-bit AQFP microprocessor called MANA (Monolithic Adiabatic iNtegration Architecture). The AQFP is capable of data processing and data storage, it can operate up to a clock frequency of 2.5 GHz making this on par with today’s computing technologies. They expect this to increase to 5-10 GHz as they make improvements in design methodology and experimental setup. According to the researchers even when taking this cooling overhead into account, the AQFP is still about 80 times more energy-efficient when […]
Author Archives: Hema Viswanath
Metasurface enabled quantum edge detection
Phys.org December 29, 2020 Metasurfaces consisting of engineered dielectric or metallic structures provide unique solutions to realize exotic phenomena including negative refraction, achromatic focusing, electromagnetic cloaking, and so on. The intersection of metasurface and quantum optics may lead to new opportunities but is much less explored. An international team of researchers (China, USA – UC San Diego, Columbia University, Harvard University, Austria) proposed and experimentally demonstrated that a polarization-entangled photon source can be used to switch ON or OFF the optical edge detection mode in an imaging system based on a high-efficiency dielectric metasurface. This experiment enriches both fields of […]
New quantum nanodevice can simultaneously act as a heat engine and a refrigerator
Phys.org December 28, 2020 An international team of researchers (Japan, Ukraine, USA – University of Michigan) has experimentally demonstrated the quantum version of the heat engine which uses an electron in a transistor. The electron has two possible energy states. The team could increase or decrease the gap between these energy states by applying an electric field and microwaves. This can be analogous to the periodic expanding–compressing operation of a fluid in a chamber. The device also emitted microwaves when the electron went from the high-energy level to the lower one. By monitoring whether the upper energy level was occupied, […]
Powering up stretchy technology
Nanowerk December 30,2020 Implantable devices need electronics that can be integrated with soft tissue and accommodate the motion of the body. A team of researchers in the US (Michigan State University, Duke University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory) is working on “plant wearables,” which are sensors for crops that can stretch and bend as the plants grow and move. To power these devices they used 4D printing to create supercapacitors that can stretch to new limits without compromising their electrochemical performance. The team used an aerosol jet printer to directly deposit a specially formulated ink onto a stretchable polymer substrate. The […]
Researchers achieve sustained, high-fidelity quantum teleportation
Phys.org December 29, 2020 An international team of researchers (USA – Caltech, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, industry, Harvard University, Canada) used fiber-coupled devices, including state-of-the-art low-noise superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors and off-the-shelf optics to achieve conditional quantum teleportation of time-bin qubits at the telecommunication wavelength of 1536.5 nm. They measured teleportation fidelities that are consistent with an analytical model of their system, which includes realistic imperfections. To demonstrate the compatibility of the setup with deployed quantum networks, they teleported qubits over 22 km of single-mode fiber while transmitting qubits over an additional 22 km of fiber. Their systems, which are […]
Shapeshifting crystals: Varying stability in different forms of gallium selenide monolayers
Phys.org December 24, 2020 Gallium selenide monolayer has been recently discovered to have an alternative crystal structure and has diverse potential applications in electronics. Researchers in Japan studied the structural stability and electronic states of GaSe monolayer with trigonal-antiprismatic (AP) structure by first-principles calculations. The AP-phase GaSe monolayer was found stable, and the differences in energy and lattice constant were small when compared to those calculated for a GaSe monolayer with conventional trigonal-prismatic (P) structure which was found to be the ground state. Moreover, it was revealed that the relative stability of P-phase and AP-phase GaSe monolayers reverses under tensile […]
Stretching diamond for next-generation microelectronics
Science Daily December 31, 2020 An international team of researchers (Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, USA – UC Berkeley, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, MIT) microfabricated single-crystalline diamond bridge structures with ~1 micrometer length by ~100 nanometer width and achieved sample-wide uniform elastic strains under uniaxial tensile loading at room temperature. They demonstrated deep elastic straining of diamond microbridge arrays. The ultra large, highly controllable elastic strains can fundamentally change the bulk band structures of diamond, including a substantial calculated bandgap reduction as much as ~2 electron volts. Their findings have shown the potential of strained diamonds as prime candidates for advanced […]
Tiny terahertz laser is the first to reach three key performance goals at once
Nanowerk December 30, 2020 A photonic wire laser (PWL) is a type of laser built on a semiconductor chip that has nanometer-sized bore and a millimeter length cavity. Coupling multiple adjacent PWLs can synchronize the light beams to emit at the same or multiple wavelengths and combine their power. A team of researchers in the US (MIT, Sandia National Laboratory) proposed and demonstrated a scheme to form a coupled cavity by taking advantage of this unique feature of photonic wire lasers. They used quantum cascade lasers with antenna-coupled third-order distributed feedback grating as the platform. Inspired by the chemistry of […]
Top MIT research stories of 2020
MIT News December 22, 2020 The year’s popular research stories include astronomical firsts, scientific breakthroughs, and engineering milestones addressing Covid-19 and other global problems. Despite the new challenges brought on by Covid-19 — and sometimes because of them — MIT’s community achieved important milestones on the frontiers of science and engineering. 10 research-related stories published in the previous 12 months received top views on MIT News…read more.
Top 10 Science and Technology Inventions for the Week of December 25, 2020
01. Developing smarter, faster machine intelligence with light 02. Experiment takes ‘snapshots’ of light, stops light, uses light to change properties of matter 03. Perfect transmission through barrier using sound 04. Skyrmions proposed as the basis for a completely new computer architecture 05. When light and atoms share a common vibe 06. New energy conversion layer for biosolar cells 07. Researchers propose process to detect and contain emerging diseases 08. Chemists convert plastic bottle waste into insecticide sorbent 09. Artificial intelligence solves Schrödinger’s equation 10. Nature Podcast highlights of 2020 (47 min)