Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Engineers grow 'perfect' atom-thin materials on industrial silicon wafers      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Engineers fabricated 2D materials that could lead to next-generation transistors and electronic films.

Energy: Nuclear Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Researchers gain deeper understanding of mechanism behind superconductors      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Physicists have once again gained a deeper understanding of the mechanism behind superconductors. This brings researchers one step closer to their goal of developing the foundations for a theory for superconductors that would allow current to flow without resistance and without energy loss. The researchers found that in superconducting copper-oxygen bonds, called cuprates, there must be a very specific charge distribution between the copper and the oxygen, even under pressure.

Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Preventing vehicle crashes by learning from insects      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Despite only about 25% of car travel happening after dark, almost half of fatal accidents occur at night. As our vehicles become more advanced and even autonomous, the ways of detecting and avoiding these collisions must evolve too. Current systems are often complicated, resource-intensive or work poorly in the dark. But now, researchers have designed a simple, power-saving collision detector inspired by the way insects avoid bumping into one another.

Space: Astrophysics Space: Structures and Features
Published

A star's unexpected survival      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Hundreds of millions of light-years away in a distant galaxy, a star orbiting a supermassive black hole is being violently ripped apart under the black hole's immense gravitational pull. As the star is shredded, its remnants are transformed into a stream of debris that rains back down onto the black hole to form a very hot, very bright disk of material swirling around the black hole, called an accretion disc. This phenomenon -- where a star is destroyed by a supermassive black hole and fuels a luminous accretion flare -- is known as a tidal disruption event (TDE), and it is predicted that TDEs occur roughly once every 10,000 to 100,000 years in a given galaxy.

Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

AI discovers new nanostructures      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Scientists have successfully demonstrated that autonomous methods can discover new materials. The artificial intelligence (AI)-driven technique led to the discovery of three new nanostructures, including a first-of-its-kind nanoscale 'ladder.'

Energy: Alternative Fuels Engineering: Nanotechnology Space: Astrophysics Space: Structures and Features Space: The Solar System
Published

The world in grains of interstellar dust      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Understanding how dust grains form in interstellar gas could offer significant insights to astronomers and help materials scientists develop useful nanoparticles.

Space: Astrophysics Space: Cosmology Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features
Published

Researchers measure size-luminosity relation of galaxies less than a billion years after Big Bang      (via sciencedaily.com) 

A team has studied the relation between galaxy size and luminosity of some of the earliest galaxies in the universe taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, less than a billion years after the Big Bang.

Space: Astrophysics Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features
Published

Hubble finds hungry black hole twisting captured star into donut shape      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Black holes are gatherers, not hunters. They lie in wait until a hapless star wanders by. When the star gets close enough, the black hole's gravitational grasp violently rips it apart and sloppily devours its gasses while belching out intense radiation. Astronomers have recorded a star's final moments in detail as it gets gobbled up by a black hole.

Space: Astrophysics Space: Structures and Features Space: The Solar System
Published

How do rocky planets really form?      (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new theory could explain the origin and properties of systems of rocky super-Earths and their relationship with the terrestrial planets of the solar system.

Space: Astrophysics Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features
Published

How did the Butterfly Nebula get its wings? It's complicated      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Something is amiss in the Butterfly Nebula. When astronomers compared two exposures of this planetary nebula that had been taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2009 and 2020, they saw dramatic changes in the material within its 'wings.' Powerful winds are apparently driving complex alterations of material within the Butterfly Nebula, behavior not seen in planetary nebulae to date. The researchers want to understand how such activity is possible from what should be a 'sputtering, largely moribund star with no remaining fuel.'

Energy: Batteries Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Novel design helps develop powerful microbatteries      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Translating electrochemical performance of large format batteries to microscale power sources has been a long-standing technological challenge, limiting the ability of batteries to power microdevices, microrobots and implantable medical devices. Researchers have created a high-voltage microbattery (> 9 V), with high-energy and -power density, unparalleled by any existing battery design.

Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Optical coating approach prevents fogging and unwanted reflections      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Researchers combine a polymer coating with silicon dioxide nanostructures to create a coating to prevent fogging and unwanted reflections. The technique solves a common problem for sensors such as lidar used in autonomous cars.

Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features
Published

Old and new stars paint very different pictures of the Triangulum Galaxy      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Scientists have reported something unexpected about the distinct populations of stars that make up the Triangulum galaxy: In this satellite galaxy, a close companion of the much larger Andromeda galaxy, old and new stars occur in separate parts of the galaxy's structure, something not seen in galaxies like our own and so far not reporter for other satellite galaxies.

Space: Cosmology Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features
Published

NASA's Webb uncovers star formation in cluster's dusty ribbons      (via sciencedaily.com) 

NGC 346, one of the most dynamic star-forming regions in nearby galaxies, is full of mystery. Now, it is less mysterious with new findings from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope.

Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features Space: The Solar System
Published

New Webb image reveals dusty disk like never seen before      (via sciencedaily.com) 

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has imaged the inner workings of a dusty disk surrounding a nearby red dwarf star. These observations represent the first time the previously known disk has been imaged at these infrared wavelengths of light. They also provide clues to the composition of the disk.

Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features Space: The Solar System
Published

NASA's Webb confirms its first exoplanet      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Researchers confirmed an exoplanet, a planet that orbits another star, using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope for the first time. Formally classified as LHS 475 b, the planet is almost exactly the same size as our own, clocking in at 99% of Earth's diameter.

Space: Exploration Space: Structures and Features Space: The Solar System
Published

Scientists study life origins by simulating a cosmic evolution      (via sciencedaily.com) 

Amino acids make up millions of proteins that drive the chemical gears of life, including essential bodily functions in animals. Because of amino acids' relationship to living things scientists are eager to understand the origins of these molecules. After all, amino acids may have helped spawn life on Earth after being delivered here about 4 billion years ago by pieces of asteroids or comets.

Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Now on the molecular scale: Electric motors      (via sciencedaily.com)     Original source 

Electric vehicles, powered by macroscopic electric motors, are increasingly prevalent on our streets and highways. Now a multidisciplinary team has made an electric motor you can't see with the naked eye: an electric motor on the molecular scale. This early work -- a motor that can convert electrical energy into unidirectional motion at the molecular level -- has implications for materials science and particularly medicine, where the electric molecular motor could team up with biomolecular motors in the human body.

Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Researchers uncover mechanisms to easily dry, redisperse cellulose nanocrystals      (via sciencedaily.com)     Original source 

A team of chemical engineering researchers studied the mechanisms of drying the nanocrystals and proposed nanotechnology to render the nanocrystals highly redispersible in aqueous mediums, while retaining their full functionality, to make them easier to store and transport.

Engineering: Graphene Engineering: Nanotechnology
Published

Discovery of a new form of carbon called Long-range Ordered Porous Carbon (LOPC)      (via sciencedaily.com) 

The most well-known forms of carbon include graphite and diamond, but there are other more exotic nanoscale allotropes of carbon as well. These include graphene and fullerenes, which are sp2 hybridized carbon with zero (flat-shaped) or positive (sphere-shaped) curvatures. Researchers now report the discovery of a new form of carbon formed by heating fullerenes with lithium nitride.