Rice engineers find evidence of little-understood force in everyday emulsions

Scientists at Rice University have discovered that a little-understood tensile force, which was previously thought to be an oddity found only in the types of plastics used to make bulletproof vests, occurs in everyday emulsions like mayonnaise and salad dressing.

First identified about 25 years ago, the phenomenon known as “negative first normal stress difference” refers to an attractive force that

Hyperbranched polymers – tree-like molecules – are not particularly useful for the creation of plastic films and molded parts because they don’t entangle. So Virginia Tech researchers have created segmented hyperbranched plastics, which do entangle and result in high-performance polymers.

Virginia Tech chemistry professor Timothy E. Long of Blacksburg will describe the configuration and functionality of the new family of polymers at the 227th Annual Meeting of the American Chemical Soc

By bombarding very thin slices of several copper/oxygen compounds, called cuprates, with very bright, short-lived pulses of light, Ivan Bozovic, a physicist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, and his collaborators have discovered an unusual property of the materials: After absorbing the light energy, they emit it as long-lived sound waves, as opposed to heat energy. This result may open up a new field of study on cuprates — materials already used in wireless comm

High-quality nanopowders made of refractory ceramics are a rare and very expensive material. All known methods of their manufacturing face the same problems – scanty quantities, extensive variety of particle sizes and expensive production. Researchers from the town of Tomsk have invented and manufactured a device to produce a choice selection of particles – all particles are equal to the required size and inexpensive. The project has been funded by two foundations – the Russian Foundation for Basic R

A new class of fibers

Strong and versatile carbon nanotubes are finding new applications in improving conventional polymer-based fibers and films. For example, composite fibers made from single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) and polyacrylonitrile – a carbon fiber precursor – are stronger, stiffer and shrink less than standard fibers.

Nanotube-reinforced composites could ultimately provide the foundation for a new class of strong and lightweight fibers with properties such a

Innovative polymer chemistry employed

Carnegie Mellon University scientists have developed an attractive way to make discrete carbon nanoparticles for electrical components used in industry and research. This method, which employs polyacrylonitrile (PAN) as a nanoparticle precursor, is being presented by Chuanbing Tang, a Carnegie Mellon graduate student, on Sunday, March 28, at the 227th annual meeting of the American Chemical Society in Anaheim, Calif. (POLY69, Garden A). The resear

In what may sound like a project from a high school science fair, scientists are using a household humidifier to create porous spheres a hundred times smaller than a red blood cell. The technique is a new and inexpensive way to do chemistry using sound waves, the researchers say.

In the home, ultrasonic humidifiers are used to raise humidity, reduce static electricity and ease discomfort from the common cold or cough. In the lab, chemists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ar

A scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, working with colleagues at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, has caused an individual carbon nanotube to emit light for the first time. This step in research on carbon nanotubes may help to materialize many of the proposed applications for carbon nanotubes, such as in electronics and photonics development.

The light emission is the result of a process called “electron-hole recombination.” By running an el

Creating a tool small enough to measure friction on a microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) device is not an easy task. The tool has to be about the width of a human hair.

Yet, researchers at the at the National Nuclear Security Administration’s Sandia National Laboratories have developed a new “inchworm” actuator instrument that provides detailed information about friction at the microscale.

The main objective of the project was to study the validity of Amonton’s Law at

Russian researchers produce crystals of various colors and shades based on yttrium, aluminium and oxygen. Outwardly, they practically do not differ from well-known semiprecious garnet stones. However, artificially produced crystals possess higher solidity, and the color variety is much wider than that of their natural “relatives”.

Sometimes a minor thing is sufficient to change the situation beyond recognition. That is particularly important in chemistry, especially in chemistry of crystals.

Self-cleaning hydrogen sensors may soon join the ranks of self-cleaning ovens, self-cleaning windows and self-cleaning public toilets, according to Penn State researchers.

“The photocatalytic properties of titania nanotubes are so large — a factor of 100 times greater than any other form of titania — that sensor contaminants are efficiently removed with exposure to ultraviolet light, so that the sensors effectively recover or retain their original hydrogen sensitivity in real world applic

Like spiders spinning webs, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign are creating complex, three-dimensional structures with micron-size features using a robotic deposition process called direct-write assembly.

As reported in the March 25 issue of the journal Nature, Jennifer Lewis and her research team have developed novel inks that readily flow through micro-capillary nozzles and then rapidly solidify to retain their shape. Patterning such fine structures could be use

The development of new types of artificial materials, known as “metamaterials” and with electromagnetic properties not found in nature, is the aim of the Metamorphose Excellence European Network, of which the Public University of Navarre forms part, together with twenty-one other research institutions from 13 European countries.

Perfect plane lenses

Metamaterials are electromagnetic and multifunctional artificial materials, created in order to comply with certain specificati

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory have discovered an interesting type of electronic behavior in a recently discovered class of superconductors known as cobalt oxides, or cobaltates. These materials operate quite differently from other oxide superconductors, namely the copper oxides (or cuprates), which are commonly referred to as high-temperature superconductors.

When traditional superconductors are cooled to nearly absolute zero (0 Kelvin or –452

Carbon dioxide, an environmentally friendly solvent for dyeing and dry cleaning, may become a valuable new tool for making medical implants, according to a study at Ohio State University.

Engineers here used compressed carbon dioxide (CO2) to push chemicals into a plastic that is often used as a bone replacement. With further development, the technology could be used in a wide range of plastics that release medicines — from antibiotics to anti-tumor agents -– into the body.

The hig

Researchers have subjected volunteers to the sounds of cockerels, bells, babies crying and footsteps to find out how people perceive urgency and pleasantness.

The two-year EPSRC-funded project aims to find the most appropriate sounds – such as those of screeching tyres or car horns – to warn drivers of hazards on the road.

Researchers from the school of psychology are helping car manufacturers come up with the best ‘audible icons’ to convey alerts to drivers by discovering the appr