AFCEA October 11, 2022 Globally, governments and industry are recognizing the promise that the biological sciences can offer, but it is also critical to recognize the evolving perils such innovation can entail. Looking toward this future, over the past five years, IARPA has launched 10 new bio-focused programs including the Finding Engineering Linked Indicators (FELIX) program, which contributed to the first IC public statement that the SARS-CoV-2 virus was not genetically engineered as well as the Molecular Information Storage (MIST) program, which is pursuing new ways of using biology for scalable data storage. IARPA is situated to empower the entire […]
Electrical gating of the charge-density-wave quantum phases opens innovative electronic applications
Nanowerk November 1, 2022 Recent years witnessed a rebirth of the field of CDW materials and devices, partially driven by an interest in layered quasi-2D van der Waals materials where CDW phases can manifest themselves at room temperature. Despite numerous attempts, the electrical gating of the CDW phase, which is needed for many practical applications, remained elusive. An international team of researchers (USA – UC Riverside, University of Georgia, Poland) has demonstrated the electrical gating of the charge-density-wave phases and current in h-BN-capped three-terminal 1T-TaS2 heterostructure devices. The evolution of the hysteresis and the presence of abrupt spikes in the […]
In nanotube science, is boron nitride the new carbon?
Nanowerk October 31, 2022 Boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) possess a broad range of applications because of several engineering-relevant properties, including high specific strength and stiffness, thermal stability, and transparency to visible light. The morphology of the nanoscale fibers must be controlled to maximize such properties, which can be achieved by synthesizing long aligned arrays of crystalline hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) nanotubes. An international team of researchers (USA – MIT, Japan) synthesized high-quality millimeter length, vertically aligned (VA-) BNNTs using free-standing carbon nanotube (CNT) arrays as scaffolds. In addition to high optical transparency of the VA-BNNTs, they also demonstrated several micro- […]
New Hybrid Virus Discovered as Flu And RSV Fuse Into Single Pathogen
Science Alert October 31, 2022 Interactions between respiratory viruses during infection affect transmission dynamics and clinical outcomes. To identify and characterize virus–virus interactions at the cellular level, researchers in the UK coinfected human lung cells with influenza A virus (IAV) and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Super-resolution microscopy, live-cell imaging, scanning electron microscopy and cryo-electron tomography revealed extracellular and membrane-associated filamentous structures consistent with hybrid viral particles (HVPs). They found that HVPs harbor surface glycoproteins and ribonucleoproteins of IAV and RSV. HVPs use the RSV fusion glycoprotein to evade anti-IAV neutralizing antibodies and infect and spread among cells lacking IAV receptors…read […]
Overcoming the optical resolution limit
Phys.org November 1, 2022 When measuring with light, the lateral extent of the structures that can be resolved by an optical imaging system is fundamentally diffraction limited. Researchers in Germany have developed an approach that uses microspheres placed directly on the surface of the object to extend the limits of interferometric topography measurements for optical resolution of small structures. They identified microspheres and photonic nanojets to explain the resolution enhancement. They extended the model with respect to microsphere-assisted interference microscopy providing a rigorous simulation of the scattered electric field directly above the sphere. Simulation and experimental results were compared in […]
Physicists see light waves moving through a metal
Nanowerk October 27, 2022 With the discovery of nodal-line semimetals, the notion of the Dirac point has been extended to lines and loops in momentum space. However, experimental evidence for the enhanced correlations in nodal-line semimetals is sparse. An international team of researchers (USA -Columbia University, University of Arkansas, Pennsylvania State University, Florida State University, National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, Flatiron Institute, China, the Netherlands, Germany) found prominent correlation effects in a nodal-line semimetal compound, ZrSiSe, through experiments and density functional theory calculations. They observed two fundamental spectroscopic hallmarks of electronic correlations: strong reduction of the free-carrier Drude weight and […]
Quantum dots form ordered material
Science Daily November 1, 2022 It is possible to accurately design the electronic properties of quantum dots just by changing their size. However, to create functional devices, many dots have to be combined into a new material. During this process, the properties of the dots are often lost. Researchers in the Netherlands have made a highly conductive optoelectronic metamaterial through controlled ordering of colloidal quantum dots in three dimensions and over large areas achieving outstanding transport properties. The measured electron mobilities are the highest ever reported for a self-assembled solid of fully quantum-confined objects. This ultimately demonstrated that optoelectronic metamaterials […]
Researchers design next-generation electrolytes for lithium batteries
Nanowerk October 29, 2022 The lithium-metal batteries cycling encounters a low Coulombic efficiency (CE) due to the unceasing electrolyte decomposition. Improving the stability of solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) suppresses the decomposition and increases CE. However, SEI morphology and chemistry alone cannot account for CE, and a full explanation is still lacking. Researchers in Japan found that in diverse electrolytes, the large shift in the Li electrode potential and its association with the Li+ coordination structure influences the CE. Machine learning regression analysis and vibrational spectroscopy revealed that the formation of ion pairs is essential for upshifting the Li electrode potential, […]
Revolutionary technique to generate hydrogen more efficiently from water
Phys.org October 27, 2022 Typically, electron transfer proceeds solely through either a metal redox chemistry or an oxygen redox chemistry without the concurrent occurrence of both metal and oxygen redox chemistries in the same electron transfer pathway. An international team of researchers (Singapore, USA – Brookhaven National Laboratory, China) has discovered an electron transfer mechanism that involves a switchable metal and oxygen redox chemistry in nickel-oxyhydroxide-based materials with light as the trigger. The proposed light-triggered coupled oxygen evolution mechanism requires the unit cell to undergo reversible geometric conversion between octahedron (NiO6) and square planar (NiO4) to achieve electronic states with […]
Scientists discover material that can be made like a plastic but conducts like metal
Science Daily October 26, 2022 An international team of researchers (USA – University of Chicago, Stony Brook University, Argonne National Laboratory, South Korea) discovered a way to create a material that can be made like a plastic but conducts electricity more like a metal when they strung nickel atoms like pearls into a string of molecular beads made of carbon and sulfur. The material easily and strongly conducted electricity when heated or chilled or exposed to air and humidity, or even dripped acid and base. But the most striking thing was that the molecular structure of the material was disordered. […]