Phys.org February 7, 2022 Researchers in Germany produced nanowires consisting of a gallium arsenide core and an indium aluminum arsenide shell. The different chemical ingredients resulted in the crystal structures in the shell and the core having slightly different lattice spacings. This causes the shell to exert a high mechanical strain on the much thinner core changing the electronic properties of gallium arsenide in the core. They demonstrated that the strain in lattice-mismatched core/shell nanowires can affect the effective mass of electrons in a way that boosts their mobility to distinct levels. The electrons inside core of nanowires exhibited mobility […]
Nipah Virus–Another Threat From the World of Zoonotic Viruses
Frontiers in Microbiology January 25, 2022 The Nipah virus (NiV) belonging to the Paramyxoviridae family was reported in Malaysia in 1998/1999. According to the researchers in Poland due to its high mortality in humans, its zoonotic nature, the possibility of human-to-human transmission, and the lack of an available vaccine, the World Health Organization (WHO) has recognized Nipah virus as a global health problem. Depending on strain specificity, neurological symptoms and severe respiratory disorders are observed in NiV infection. In most confirmed cases of NiV epidemics, the appearance of the virus in humans was associated with the presence of various animal […]
Researchers use tiny magnetic swirls to generate true random numbers
Science Daily February 7, 2022 Researchers at Brown University have shown that the local dynamics of skyrmions, in contrast to the global dynamics of a skyrmion, can be introduced to provide effective functionalities for versatile computing. A single skyrmion interacting with local pinning centres under thermal effects can fluctuate in time and switch between a small-skyrmion and a large-skyrmion state, thereby serving as a robust true random number generator for probabilistic computing. Moreover, neighbouring skyrmions exhibit an anti-correlated coupling in their fluctuation dynamics. Both the switching probability and the dynamic coupling strength can be tuned by modifying the applied magnetic […]
Riding a laser to Mars
Phys.org February 8, 2022 Responding a NASA solicitation to send a sagecraft to Mars using laser, researchers in Canada are exploring laser-thermal propulsion. An Earth-based laser array of 10 m diameter and power 100 MW would be able to deliver laser power to spacecraft in cislunar space, where the incident laser is focused into a hydrogen heating chamber via an inflatable reflector. The hydrogen propellant is then exhausted through a nozzle to realize specific impulses of 3000 s. The architecture is shown to be immediately reusable via a burn-back maneuver to return the propulsion unit while still within range of […]
Scientists discover a mysterious transition in an electronic crystal
Phys.org February 7, 2022 Hysteresis underlies many phase transitions in solids, giving rise to exotic metastable states that are otherwise inaccessible. An international team of researchers (USA – MIT, UC Berkeley, Stanford University, SLAC Linear Accelerator Laboratory, Cornell University, Argonne National Laboratory, Clemson University, China, Russia, Germany) reported an unconventional hysteretic transition in a quasi-2D material, EuTe4. They observed that the hysteresis loop has a temperature width of more than 400 K, setting a record among crystalline solids. The transition has an origin distinct from known mechanisms, lying entirely within the incommensurate charge density wave (CDW) phase of EuTe4 with […]
Scientists engineer new material that can absorb and release enormous amounts of energy
Phys.org February 2, 2022 Solid–solid phase transformations can affect energy transduction and change material properties. A team of researchers at UMass Amherst developed elasto-magnetic metamaterials that display phase transformation behaviors due to nonlinear interactions between internal elastic structures and embedded, macroscale magnetic domains. They also developed the design algorithms that allow these materials to be programmed with specific responses, making them predictable. Using predictive model, they developed a quantitative phase map that relates the geometry and magnetic interactions to the phase transformation. According to the researchers their work demonstrates that the new material holds great promise for a very wide […]
Study raises new possibilities for triggering room-temperature superconductivity with light
Phys.org February 9, 2022 An international team of researchers (South Korea, USA – SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Germany, Japan) explored a photoinduced normal state of YBCO through a charge density wave (CDW) with time-resolved resonant soft x-ray scattering, as well as a high magnetic field x-ray scattering. In the nonequilibrium state where people predict a quenched superconducting state based on the previous optical spectroscopies, they experimentally observed a similar analogy to the competition between superconductivity and CDW shown in the equilibrium state. Their results provide a critical clue that the characteristics of the photoinduced normal state show a solid resemblance […]
Super-elastic high-entropy Elinvar alloy discovered with potential for aerospace engineering
EurekAlert February 9, 2022 An international team of researchers (Hong Kong, China, USA- Argonne National Laboratory, France) has discovered a high-entropy alloy called Co25Ni25(HfTiZr)50, (high-entropy Elinvar alloy) reveals the Elinvar effect, that is the alloy firmly retains its elastic modulus over a very wide range of temperature changes. It becomes slightly stiffer than, it is at room temperature, and it expands without any notable phase transition. The experiment verified that the microstructure and mechanical properties of the alloy were insensitive to annealing at 1,273 K (1,000 °C) for different time durations. Because of the combination of the unique structural features, […]
Sustainable batteries roadmap to 2030 and beyond
Nanowerk February 9, 2022 A team of EU researchers has developed a roadmap that presents the research ideas proposed by BATTERY 2030+, the European large-scale research initiative for future battery chemistries. A “chemistry-neutral” roadmap to advance battery research is outlined with a time horizon of more than ten years. The roadmap is centered around six themes: 1) accelerated materials discovery platform, 2) battery interface genome, with the integration of smart functionalities such as 3) sensing and 4) self-healing processes. Beyond chemistry related aspects also include crosscutting research regarding 5) manufacturability and 6) recyclability. The roadmap should be seen as an […]
Tiny electrical vortexes bridge gap between ferroelectric and ferromagnetic materials
EurekAlert February 9, 2022 An international team of researchers (UK, Ireland, USA – Argonne National Laboratory) created a thin film of the ferroelectric lead titanate sandwiched between layers of the ferromagnet strontium ruthenate, each about 4 nanometres thick. The structure of the combined layers revealed that the domains in the lead titanate were a complex topological structure of lines of vortexes, spinning alternately in different directions. Almost identical behaviour has also been seen in ferromagnets where it is known to be generated by the Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya interaction (DMi). According to the researchers the difference between ferromagnetism and ferroelectricity becomes less and […]