DITF laboratory researches the use of lime bast and flax. The beginnings of textile manufacturing date back more than 30,000 years. Not only clothing, but also technical textiles were made from sometimes surprising materials. More than 2,500 textile fragments from pile dwelling settlements at Lake Constance and Upper Swabia were the basis for a large research project investigating prehistoric textile crafts. The German Institutes for Textile and Fiber Research Denkendorf (DITF) were responsible for material testing using modern analytical methods….
International collaboration, led by DIPC and Princeton, creates a catalogue of materials that could impact quantum technologies. The world’s first catalogue of flat band materials, published this week in Nature journal, could reduce the serendipity in the search for new materials with exotic quantum properties, such as magnetism and superconductivity, with applications in memory devices or in long-range dissipationless transport of power. Finding the right ingredients to create materials with exotic quantum properties has been a chimera for experimental scientists,…
Studying impact craters to uncover the secrets of the solar system. While for humans the constants might be death and taxes, for planets the constants are gravity and collisions. Brandon Johnson studies the latter, using information about impacts to understand the history and the composition of planets, moons, asteroids and meteorites throughout the solar system. “Impact cratering is the most ubiquitous surface process shaping planetary bodies,” Johnson said. “Craters are found on almost every solid body we’ve ever seen. They…
Very premature babies need extra oxygen and mechanical intervention to breathe, but this damages their lungs, causing a chronic lung disease called bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD). These babies have smaller and weaker lungs that can’t send as much oxygen to their growing brains. The lack of oxygen during brain development can lead to learning disabilities, or problems walking, hearing and seeing. There is no cure for BPD, but Dr. Bernard Thébaud and his team are hoping to change that. The team previously…
Refining metals, manufacturing fertilizers and powering fuel cells for heavy vehicles are all processes that require purified hydrogen. But purifying, or separating, that hydrogen from a mix of other gases can be difficult, with several steps. A research team led by Chris Arges, Penn State associate professor of chemical engineering, demonstrated that the process can be simplified using a pump outfitted with newly developed membrane materials. The researchers used an electrochemical hydrogen pump to both separate and compress hydrogen with…
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has established an extraordinary new benchmark: detecting the light of a star that existed within the first billion years after the universe’s birth in the big bang – the farthest individual star ever seen to date. The find is a huge leap further back in time from the previous single-star record holder; detected by Hubble in 2018. That star existed when the universe was about 4 billion years old, or 30 percent of its current age, at…
A collaborative new study led by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania demonstrates topological control capabilities in an acoustic system, with implications for applications such as 5G communications and quantum information processing. New research published in Nature Electronics describes topological control capabilities in an integrated acoustic-electronic system at technologically relevant frequencies. This work paves the way for additional research on topological properties in devices that use high-frequency sound waves, with potential applications including 5G communications and quantum information processing. The study was…
Team of U.S. and Chinese researchers confirms predictions about the quantum behavior of the exotic magnets. Working with a quantum material known as a kagome magnet, a team of Boston College physicists and colleagues have directly measured how individual electronic quantum states in the novel material respond to external magnetic fields by shifting energy in an unusual manner, the researchers report in the latest online edition of the journal Nature Physics. The measurements generated by the project are the first of…
A team co-led team by the University of Surrey has successfully increased the levels of energy absorbed by wafer-thin photovoltaic panels by 25%. Their solar panels, just one micrometre thick (1μm), convert light into electricity more efficiently than others as thin and pave the way to make it easier to general more clean, green energy. In a paper published in the American Chemical Society’s Photonics journal, the team detail how they used characteristics of sunlight to design a disordered honeycomb…
One in every 500 to 1,000 males are born with one or more extra X chromosomes, leading to a wide range of progressing symptoms with each extra chromosome, including infertility, enlarged breasts, osteoporosis, diabetes, heart abnormalities, intellectual disability and cancer. Now, KAUST scientists have used stem cells, reprogrammed from people with this condition, to improve understanding of how it develops. People born as males typically have one X and one Y chromosome, whereas females have two X chromosomes. One of…
Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) Department of Systems Engineering Assistant Professor Tony Pollman, along with university graduates U.S. Navy Lt. Nicholas Bailey and Lt. Christopher Girouard, were issued a provisional patent by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Feb. 10, for a novel apparatus using a dual-Stirling engine charge and recovery method for liquid air energy storage (LAES) systems. “This is a technology that has the potential to shape things we do in life,” said Pollman. Put simply, the dual-Stirling engine…
High resolution illumination of Earth’s interior down to the planet’s core with 3D global numerical simulations. Earthquakes do more than buckle streets and topple buildings. Seismic waves generated by earthquakes pass through the Earth, acting like a giant MRI machine and providing clues to what lies inside the planet. Seismologists have developed methods to take wave signals from the networks of seismometers at the Earth’s surface and reverse engineer features and characteristics of the medium they pass through, a process…
Findings could lead to new treatments for health problems ranging from neurodevelopmental disorders to cancer. UT Southwestern researchers have identified a four-protein complex that appears to play a key role in generating ribosomes – organelles that serve as protein factories for cells – as well as a surprising part in neurodevelopmental disorders. These findings, published in Cell Reports, could lead to new ways to manipulate ribosome production, which could impact a variety of conditions that affect human health. “Ribosomes are fundamental for…
A POSTECH research team led by Professor Gil-Ho Lee and Gil Young Cho (Department of Physics) has developed a platform that can control the properties of solid materials with light and measure them. Recognized for developing a platform to control and measure the properties of materials in various ways with light, the findings from the study were published in the top international academic journal Nature on March 15, 2022 (GMT). The electrical properties of a material are determined by the…
The downpours, which can affect satellites and space travel, are caused by electromagnetic whistler waves, scientists say. UCLA scientists have discovered a new source of super-fast, energetic electrons raining down on Earth, a phenomenon that contributes to the colorful aurora borealis but also poses hazards to satellites, spacecraft and astronauts. The researchers observed unexpected, rapid “electron precipitation” from low-Earth orbit using the ELFIN mission, a pair of tiny satellites built and operated on the UCLA campus by undergraduate and graduate students…
A bandage that releases medication as soon as an infection starts in a wound could treat injuries more efficiently. Empa researchers are currently working on polymer fibers that soften as soon as the environment heats up due to an infection, thereby releasing antimicrobial drugs. It is not possible to tell from the outside whether a wound will heal without problems under the dressing or whether bacteria will penetrate the injured tissue and ignite an inflammation. To be on the safe…
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