Category Chemistry/Nanotechnology

Researchers from Drexel University’s College of Engineering have developed a way to “spray paint” invisibly thin antennas from a type of two-dimensional material called MXene. The antennas perform as well or better than the ones currently used in mobile devices and RFID tags.
Credit: Drexel University – Kanit Hantanasirisakul

Engineering researchers report a method for spraying invisibly thin antennas, made from a type of two-dimensional, metallic material called MXene, that perform as well as those being used in mobile devices, wireless routers and portable transducers.

The promise of wearables, functional fabrics, the Internet of Things, and their “next-generation” technological cohort seems tantalizingly within reach...

Purdue researcher Jialiang Tang helped resolve charging issues in sodium-ion batteries that have prevented the technology from advancing to industry testing and use.
Credit: Purdue University Marketing and Media photo

Worldwide efforts to make sodium-ion batteries just as functional as lithium-ion batteries have long since controlled sodium’s tendency to explode, but not yet resolved how to prevent sodium-ions from ‘getting lost’ during the first few times a battery charges and discharges. Now, researchers made a sodium powder version that fixes this problem and holds a charge properly.

Most of today’s batteries are made up of rare lithium mined from the mountains of South America. If the world depletes this source, then battery production could stagnate...

Formation of the layered conductive magnet CrCl2(pyrazine)2 through redox-active coordination chemistry. Nature Chemistry, 2018; DOI: 10.1038/s41557-018-0107-7

An international team led by Assistant Professor Kasper Steen Pedersen, DTU Chemistry, has synthesized a novel nano material with electrical and magnetic properties making it suitable for future quantum computers and other applications in electronics.

Chromium-Chloride-Pyrazine (chemical formula CrCl2(pyrazine)2) is a layered material, which is a precursor for a so-called 2D material. In principle, a 2D material has a thickness of just a single molecule and this often leads to properties very different from those of the same material in a normal 3D version. Not least will the electrical properties differ...

Experimental two-electrode setup showing the photoelectrochemical cell illuminated with simulated solar light.
Credit: Katarzyna Sokól

New research in the field of semi-artificial photosynthesis. They used natural sunlight to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen using a mixture of biological components and humanmade technologies. The research could now be used to revolutionise the systems used for renewable energy production.

A new paper, published in Nature Energy, outlines how academics at the Reisner Laboratory in Cambridge developed their platform to achieve unassisted solar-driven water-splitting. Their method also managed to absorb more solar light than natural photosynthesis...