While a movie about giant robots that undergo structural transformations is breaking box office records this summer, a scientific study about structural transformations within single nanocrystals is breaking new ground for the design of novel materials that will serve next-generation energy storage batteries and solar energy harvesting devices. Researchers at the U.S.
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DETROIT – Contrary to popular belief, so-called hypoallergenic dogs do not have lower household allergen levels than other dogs.
That's the conclusion of a study by Henry Ford Hospital researchers who sought to evaluate whether hypoallergenic dogs have a lower dog allergen in the home than other dogs. Hypoallergenic dogs are believed to produce less dander and saliva and shed less fur.
Researchers have discovered a way to capture and harness energy transmitted by such sources as radio and television transmitters, cell phone networks and satellite communications systems. By scavenging this ambient energy from the air around us, the technique could provide a new way to power networks of wireless sensors, microprocessors and communications chips.
Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have created a tunable superconducting circuit on a chip that can place a single microwave photon (particle of light) in two frequencies, or colors, at the same time.
In a typical year, California gets about 30 percent of its water from groundwater wells. Yet when it comes to managing this precious resource, the state of California relies on a mixed bag of more than 2,000 local water agencies with varying degrees of authority.
Using a combination of sophisticated computer modeling and advanced materials analysis techniques at synchrotron laboratories, a research team led by the University at Buffalo (UB) and including the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the Molecular Foundry at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and SEMATECH* has demonstrated how some relatively simple processing flaws can seriously degrade the otherwise near-magical electronic properties of graphene.
If materials scientists accompanied their research with theme songs, a team from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Maryland (UMD) might be tempted to choose the garage punk song "Don't Crowd Me"* as the anthem for the promising, but still experimental nanocomposite fire retardants they are studying.
That's because the collaborators have demonstrated that the more widely and uniformly dispersed nanoscale plates of clay are in a polymer, the more fire protection the nanocomposite material provides.
Scientists with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) are identifying factors that influence pesticide levels in the Chesapeake Bay airshed, including traces of "legacy" pesticides that still linger even though they are no longer being used.
Wind farms in China and small-scale solar panels on rooftops in Europe were largely responsible for last year's 32% rise in green energy investments worldwide according to the latest annual report on renewable energy investment trends issued by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).
Last year, investors pumped a record $211 billion into renewables -- about one-third more than the $160 billion invested in 2009, and a 540% rise since 2004.
Twitter allows millions of social media fans to comment in 140 characters or less on just about anything: an actor's outlandish behavior, an earthquake's tragic toll or the great taste of a grilled cheese sandwich.
But by sifting through this busy flood of banter, is it possible to also track important public health trends? Two Johns Hopkins University computer scientists would respond with a one-word tweet: "Yes!"
The first two weeks of June 2010 were a blur for six scientists fromthe U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory(Berkeley Lab). As the world focused on the ongoing crisis in the Gulfof Mexico after the blowout of BP's Deepwater Horizon Macondo well,the scientists dropped everything to estimate how much oil was flowingfrom the mangled wellhead.
The clock was ticking: Their work would help assess the environmentalimpact of the disaster, as well as develop ways to cap the well, whichhad been spewing unchecked since April 20.
By pairing an award-winning remote-detection version of NMR/MRI technology with a unique version of chromatography specifically designed for microfluidic chips, researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have opened the door to a portable system for highly sensitive multi-dimensional chemical analysis that would be impractical if not impossible with conventional technologies.
Cambridge, Mass. – July 6, 2011 – By applying a coating to individual silicon nanowires, researchers at Harvard and Berkeley have significantly improved the materials' efficiency and sensitivity.
The findings, published in the May 20, 2011, issue of Nano Letters, suggest that the coated wires hold promise for photodetectors and energy harvesting technologies like solar cells.
Probiotic bacteria are rapidly gaining ground as healthy food supplements. However, the production of this "functional food" has its pitfalls: only few probiotic bacterial strains are robust enough to survive conventional production processes. Researchers from Technische Universitaet Muenchen have now developed a particularly gentle method that allows the use of thus far unutilized probiotics. The outcome is beneficial for both manufacturers and consumers: it's energy and cost efficient -- and it makes probiotics less perishable.