Eurekalert December 26, 2018 An international team of researchers (China, Japan) demonstrates that topological propagation of electromagnetic waves can be induced using conventional materials in a simple structure. Because topological electromagnetic wave propagation is immune to backscatter even when pathways turn sharply, designs of compact electromagnetic circuits become possible, leading to miniaturization and high integration of electronics devices. In addition, the direction of vortex and the vorticity associated with topological electromagnetic modes may be used as data carriers in high-density information communications. All these features may contribute to the development of advanced information society represented by IoT and autonomous vehicles… […]
Best of Last Year—The top Phys.org articles of 2018
Phys.org December 21, 2018 It was another great year for science, and physics was front and center. Here is a selection of great advances and discoveries reported by Phy.org in 2018… read more.
An Amoeba Just Found an Entirely New Way to Solve a Classic Computing Problem
Science Alert December 21, 2018 An international team of researchers (China, Japan) used a unicellular plasmodium of Physarum polycephalum to search for a solution to the travelling salesman problem (TSP) by changing its shape to minimize the risk of being exposed to aversive light stimuli. They found that the time taken by plasmodium to find a reasonably high-quality TSP solution grows linearly as the problem size increases from four to eight. The quality of the solution does not degrade despite the explosive expansion of the search space. They formulated a computational model to show that the linear-time solution can be […]
Top 10 Science and Technology Inventions for the Week of December 21, 2018
01. Cybersecurity flaws could allow adversaries to ‘circumvent’ U.S. missile defense systems 02. Hiding images and information in plain sight 03. Laser-pointing system could help tiny satellites transmit data to Earth 04. Scientists design new material to harness power of light 05. Researchers demonstrate teleportation using on-demand photons from quantum dots 06. Imperfections make photons perfect for quantum computing 07. Computer chip vulnerabilities discovered 08. U.S. Army Research Lab’s Top 10 Coolest Science, Tech Advances from 2018 09. The feature size and functional range of molecular electronic devices 10. Data use draining your battery? Tiny device to speed up memory […]
U.S. Army Research Lab’s Top 10 Coolest Science, Tech Advances from 2018
R&D Magazine December 17, 2018 The lab’s chief scientist handpicked the “coolest” advances to showcase what Army scientists and engineers are doing to support the Soldier of the future with a “Top 10” list from 2018: Transporting quantum information with minimum distortions; Ultra-broadband super-sensitive atomic antenna; Brain-like computer solves super-complex problems; Peeking inside a gas turbine’s combustor with a strong X-ray; Cool coating stops attacks of sand; A super-hero nanocrystalline alloy; Extreme power for jumping robots; New explosive is more powerful than TNT and safer; Humans teach artificially intelligent agents; Taming the atom…read more.
Turning Round Drops Square
American Physical Society Synopsis December 13, 2018 An international team of researchers (Canada, France) found that for a drop sandwiched between two thin, stretchable films can develop a noncircular outline, such as a square, with its exact shape depending on the amount of tension in the two films. They found that the partial wetting of droplets capped by taut elastic films is highly tunable. Adjusting the tension allows the contact angle and droplet morphology to be controlled. By exploiting these elastic boundaries, droplets can be made elliptical, with an adjustable aspect ratio, and can even be transformed into a nearly […]
Switch-in-a-cell electrifies life
Science Daily December 17, 2018 In a cell, proteins evolve that can respond to a single prompt in a sea of information. Natural proteins that move electrons more or less act as wires that are always there. To leverage this ability of the proteins, a team of researchers in the US (Rice University, Boston University) made a proof-of-concept metal-containing proteins. They embedded it in E. coli and introduced 4-hydroxytamoxifen, an estrogen receptor modulator to express the protein and thus were able to turn on the switch in the presence of the chemical or off in its absence. The proteins could […]
Scientists design new material to harness power of light
Phys.org December 17, 2018 An international team of researchers (USA – MIT, University of Hartford, UK. France) found that several materials with poor nonlinear characteristics can be combined, resulting in a new metamaterial that can be “tuned” to change the color of light. The enhancement comes from the way the metamaterial reshapes the flow of photons. They describe the underlying physics, compare its predictions to the experimental results, and analyze the limits of its applicability. The work opens a new direction in controlling the nonlinear response of materials and may find applications in on-chip optical circuits, drastically improving on-chip communications…read […]
Researchers demonstrate teleportation using on-demand photons from quantum dots
Phys.org December 17, 2018 Despite recent advances, the exploitation of deterministic quantum light sources in push-button quantum teleportation schemes remains a major open challenge. An international team of researchers (Austria, Italy, Sweden) has shown that photon pairs generated on demand by a GaAs quantum dot can be used to implement a teleportation protocol whose fidelity violates the classical limit (by more than 5 SDs) for arbitrary input states. They developed a theoretical framework that matches the experimental observations and that defines the degree of entanglement and indistinguishability needed to overcome the classical limit independently of the input state. The results […]
New megalibrary approach proves useful for the rapid discovery of new nanomaterials
Nanowerk December 18, 2018 A team of researchers in the US (Northwestern University, AFRL at Wright-Patterson AFB) supports the efficacy of a potentially revolutionary new tool developed at Northwestern University to rapidly test millions (even billions) of nanoparticles to determine the best one for a specific use. The tool utilizes a combinatorial library, or megalibrary, of nanoparticles in a very controlled way. The libraries are created using Mirkin’s Polymer Pen Lithography (PPL) technique, which relies on arrays with hundreds of thousands of pyramidal tips to deposit individual polymer “dots” of various sizes and composition, each loaded with different metal salts […]