FAU researchers reveal the secret of the famous Pazyryk carpet Why are the red, yellow, and blue colours used in the world’s oldest knotted-pile carpet still so vivid and bright, even after almost two and a half thousand years? Researchers at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg have now been able to uncover the secrets behind the so-called Pazyryk carpet using high-resolution x-ray fluorescence microscopy. Their findings have been published in the journal Scientific Reports. The Pazyryk carpet is the world’s oldest example of…
Researchers of the Center for Photonics and Two-Dimensional Materials at MIPT, together with their colleagues from Spain, Great Britain, Sweden, and Singapore, including co-creator of the world’s first 2D material and Nobel laureate Konstantin Novoselov, have measured giant optical anisotropy in layered molybdenum disulfide crystals for the first time. The scientists suggest that such transition metal dichalcogenide crystals will replace silicon in photonics. Birefringence with a giant difference in refractive indices, characteristic of these substances, will make it possible to…
Researchers from the Kleij group present a new route to prepare biobased polyesters with tuneable properties. Finding innovative and sustainable solutions to our material needs is one of the core objectives of green chemistry. The myriad plastics that envelop our daily life – from mattresses to food and cars – are mostly made from oil-based monomers which are the building blocks of polymers. Therefore, finding bio-based monomers for polymer synthesis is attractive to achieve more sustainable solutions in materials development….
The Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Technology and Advanced Materials IFAM in Dresden is strengthening its technological expertise in the field of pressure-supported heat treatment with the new acquisition of a Quintus Hot Isostatic Press QIH 15L. This significantly expands the possibilities, which were previously focused on spark plasma sintering technology. The researchers see the main areas of application for the new facility in, on one hand, the development of combined processes, i.e. heat treatment and hot isostatic pressing (HIP) for…
Biomaterials from Potsdam for Charité dentists Two fundamental researchers from the Department of Biomaterials are involved in the interdisciplinary research project ‘InterDent’. It aims at making dental fillings and tooth restorations more durable in the future. The German Research Foundation (DFG) is funding this project with 2.1 million euros, initially for three years. ‘Together with dental colleagues from Charité, we will study how mineralized biofilms interact with artificial filling materials. Ultimately, this fundamental knowledge will help designing such materials…
Graphene Flagship researchers have developed a new measurement standard for the analysis of graphene and layered materials that could accelerate production and optimise device fabrication. X-ray scans revolutionised medical treatments by allowing us to see inside humans without surgery. Similarly, terahertz spectroscopy penetrates graphene films allowing scientists to make detailed maps of their electrical quality, without damaging or contaminating the material. The Graphene Flagship brought together researchers from academia and industry to develop and mature this analytical technique, and now…
Things just got hairy at Princeton. Researchers found they could coat a liquid elastic on the outside of a disc and spin it to form useful, complex patterns. When spun just right, tiny spindles rise from the material as it cures. The spindles grow as the disc accelerates, forming a soft solid that resembles hairs. Inspired by biological designs and rationalized with mathematical precision, the new method could be used at an industrial scale for production with plastics, glasses, metals…
Novel catalyst material promises long-lasting, high-capacity, next-generation rechargeable batteries. At the heart of most electronics today are rechargeable lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). But their energy storage capacities are not enough for large-scale energy storage systems (ESSs). Lithium-sulfur batteries (LSBs) could be useful in such a scenario due to their higher theoretical energy storage capacity. They could even replace LIBs in other applications like drones, given their light weight and lower cost. But the same mechanism that is giving them all this…
The breakthrough combines excellent electromagnetic shielding with ease of manufacture and electrical isolation. As electronic devices saturate all corners of public and personal life, engineers are scrambling to find lightweight, mechanically stable, flexible, and easily manufactured materials that can shield humans from excessive electromagnetic radiation as well as prevent electronic devices from interfering with each other. In a breakthrough report published in Advanced Materials–the top journal in the field– engineers at the University of California, Riverside describe a flexible film…
Graphene Flagship researchers report a new method to integrate graphene and 2D materials into semiconductor manufacturing lines, a milestone for the recently launched 2D-EPL project. Two-dimensional (2D) materials have a huge potential for providing devices with much smaller size and extended functionalities with respect to what can be achieved with today’s silicon technologies. But to exploit this potential we must be able to integrate 2D materials into semiconductor manufacturing lines – a notoriously difficult step. A team of Graphene Flagship…
A team at the University of Colorado Boulder has designed new kinds of liquid crystals that mirror the complex structures of some solid crystals–a major step forward in building flowing materials that can match the colorful diversity of forms seen in minerals and gems, from lazulite to topaz. The group’s findings, published today in the journal Nature, may one day lead to new types of smart windows and television or computer displays that can bend and control light like never…
Plasma processing modifies carbon black powder to catalyze valuable chemical. Rice University researchers have created a “defective” catalyst that simplifies the generation of hydrogen peroxide from oxygen. Rice scientists treated metal-free carbon black, the inexpensive, powdered product of petroleum production, with oxygen plasma. The process introduces defects and oxygen-containing groups into the structure of the carbon particles, exposing more surface area for interactions. When used as a catalyst, the defective particles known as CB-Plasma reduce oxygen to hydrogen peroxide with…
Filaments made of polymer-coated iron oxide nanoparticles are obtained by exposing the material to a magnetic field under controlled temperature; the applications are myriad and include transporting substances into cells or directing fluids. Researchers at the University of Campinas’s Chemistry Institute (IQ-UNICAMP) in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, have developed a template-free technique to fabricate cilia of different sizes that mimic biological functions and have multiple applications, from directing fluids in microchannels to loading material into a cell, for…
Lead halide perovskites, with high refractive index and excellent optoelectronic property, have been used in both constructing high-quality optical resonators/lasers and fabricating high-efficiency light-emitting devices for advanced displays. Lenticular printing provides an illusion of depth and shows varying images upon view angles, which is considered as a promising approach towards future stereoscopic displays. To realize lenticular-printing-based display, it is required to modulate the outcoupling direction of emission light rather than that of incident light. Ideally, the lenticular-lens-like structures would be…
Distinct ‘relaxation’ identified in foams Researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University studied the dynamics of foams. When a drop of water was added to a foam raft, the bubbles rearranged themselves to reach a new stable state. The team found that bubble movement was qualitatively different depending on the range of bubble sizes present. Along with analogies with soft-jammed materials, these findings may inspire the design of new foam materials for industry. Foams are everywhere. Whether it’s soaps and detergents, meringues,…
Textiles can be coated with the biopolymer chitosan and thus made water-repellent by binding hydrophobic molecules. The good thing is that this can also replace toxic and petroleum-based substances that are currently used for textile finishing. In the last few years Fraunhofer IGB and partners in the HydroFichi project have researched how this can be done: A technology has been developed to provide fibers with the desired properties using biotechnological processes and chitosan. The manufacture of textiles is, even nowadays,…
Feedback
