Phys.org April 20, 2022 Researchers in China have designed an elaborate physical system and protocol with much enhanced performance for quantum secure communication. The design increased the secrecy capacity greatly by achieving an ultra-low quantum bit error rate of <0.1%, one order of magnitude smaller than that of existing systems. Compared to previous systems, the proposed scheme used photonic time-bin and phase states, operating at 50 MHz of repetition rate, which can be easily upgraded to over 1 GHz using current on-the-shelf technology. Their experiments demonstrated that the proposed system could tolerate more channel loss, from 5.1 dB, which is about 28.3 km in […]
Electronic nanogenerator tattoos as human-machine interfaces
Nanowerk April 19, 2022 Although triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) have proven to be excellent candidates for wearable energy harvesters, they commonly face the hurdles of poor adhesion to skin and relative thick in geometry up to several cm. Researchers in China have introduced tattoo-like triboelectric nanogenerators (TL-TENGs) made with ultrathin materials with outstanding mechanical property of high robustness and thickness of tens of μm. They have remarkable electrical characteristics, with open-circuit voltage and short circuit current reaching up to ≈180 V and ≈2.2 μA under constant tapping (≈16 kPa), respectively. With the well structural mechanics designs, the TL-TENGs can be customized […]
Geoengineering could return risk of malaria for one billion people
Phys. org April 20, 2022 Solar geoengineering is often framed as a stopgap measure to decrease the magnitude, impacts, and injustice of climate change. However, the benefits or costs of geoengineering for human health are largely unknown. An international team of researchers (USA – Georgetown University, University of Maryland, Rutgers University, University of Florida, Bangladesh, Germany, South Africa) has projected how geoengineering could impact malaria risk by comparing current transmission suitability and populations-at-risk under moderate and high greenhouse gas emissions scenarios with and without geoengineering. They showed that if geoengineering deployment cools the tropics, it could help protect high elevation […]
Graphene-hBN breakthrough to spur new LEDs, quantum computing
Science Daily April 14, 2022 Graphene-hBN structures can power LEDs that generate deep-UV light, which is impossible in today’s LEDs. Previous efforts to get ordered rows of hBN atoms that align with the graphene underneath were not successful. A team of researchers in the US (University of Michigan, Ohio State University, Yale University) discovered that neat rows of hBN atoms are more stable at high temperature than the undesirable jagged formations. They used a terraced graphene substrate and heated it to around 1600 degrees Celsius before spraying on individual boron and active nitrogen atoms resulting in neatly ordered seams of […]
Hybrid quantum bit based on topological insulators
Science Daily April 14, 2022 Topological qubits are considered to be particularly robust and largely immune to external sources of decoherence and appear to enable fast switching times comparable to those achieved by the conventional superconducting qubits used in current quantum processors. However, it is not yet clear whether we will ever succeed in producing topological qubits as a suitable material basis is still lacking to experimentally generate the special quasiparticles required for this without any doubt. An international team of researchers (Germany, UK, Denmark, the Netherlands) implemented superconducting transmon qubits with (Bi0.06Sb0.94)2Te3 topological insulator. According to the team microwave […]
Light amplification accelerates chemical reactions in aerosols
Science Daily April 14, 2022 Researchers in Switzerland reported that optical confinement could create spatial structuring of the light intensity inside the particle and thereby cause corresponding variations of photochemical rates. They probed single iron(III)–citrate particles using the iron oxidation state as a photochemical marker. Based on the results, they predicted an overall acceleration of photochemical reactions by a factor of two to three for most classes of atmospheric aerosol particles. Rotation of free aerosol particles and intraparticle molecular transport generally accelerate the photochemistry. According to the researchers, given the prevalence of optical confinement effects, their influence on aerosol particle […]
Lasers trigger magnetism in atomically thin quantum materials
Science Daily April 20, 2022 Recently two-dimensional moiré superlattices have emerged as a promising platform for quantum engineering. The power of the moiré system lies in the high tunability of its physical parameters by adjusting the layer twist angle, electrical field, moiré carrier filling and interlayer coupling. An international team of researchers (USA – University of Washington, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Hong Kong, Japan) found that optical excitation can highly tune the spin–spin interactions between moiré-trapped carriers, resulting in ferromagnetic order in WS2 /WSe2 moiré superlattices. Near the filling factor of −1/3, as the excitation power […]
Machine learning identifies antibiotic resistant bacteria that can spread between animals, humans and environment
Phys.org April 20, 2022 An international team of researchers (China, UK) studied antimicrobial resistance gene overlap between E. coli isolates collected from humans, livestock and their shared environments in a large-scale Chinese poultry farm and associated slaughterhouse. By using a computational approach that integrates machine learning, whole-genome sequencing, gene sharing network and mobile genetic elements analysis they characterized the E. coli community structure, antimicrobial resistance phenotypes and the genetic relatedness of non-pathogenic and pathogenic E. coli strains. They uncovered the network of genes, associated with antimicrobial resistance (AMR), shared across host species (animals and workers) and environments (farm and slaughterhouse). […]
New method for detecting pre-eruption warning signals at Whakaari White Island and other active volcanoes
Phys.org April 20, 2022 Even with real-time geophysical monitoring, forecasting sudden eruptions is difficult, because their precursors are hard to recognize and can vary between volcanoes. An international team of researchers (New Zealand, Belgium) has described a general seismic precursor signal for gas-driven eruptions, identified through correlation analysis of 18 well-recorded eruptions in New Zealand, Alaska, and Kamchatka. The precursor manifested in the displacement seismic amplitude ratio between medium (4.5–8 Hz) and high (8–16 Hz) frequency tremor bands, exhibited a characteristic rise in the days prior to eruptions. They interpreted this as formation of a hydrothermal seal that enables rapid pressurization of […]
Open sharing of biotechnology research: Transparency versus security
Science Daily April 14, 2022 A team of researchers in the UK examines how open science practices and the risks of misuse interface and proposes solutions to the problems identified. They argue that in the context of viral engineering, open code, data, and materials may increase the risk of the release of enhanced pathogens. Openly available machine learning models could reduce the amount of time needed in the laboratory and make pathogen engineering easier. To prevent the misuse of computational tools, controlling access to software and data may be necessary. They highlight that research preregistration, a practice promoted by the […]