Category Chemistry/Nanotechnology

Left, photograph of a large-scale silver nanowire-coated flexible film. Right, silver nanowire particles viewed under the microscope. Credit: S.K. Yoon, Korea University

A new, ultrathin film that is both transparent and highly conductive to electric current has been produced by a cheap and simple method devised by an international team of nanomaterials researchers from University of Illinois at Chicago and Korea University. The film is also bendable and stretchable, offering potential applications in roll-up touchscreen displays, wearable electronics, flexible solar cells and electronic skin.

The new film is made of fused silver nanowires, and is produced by spraying the nanowire particles through a tiny jet nozzle at supersonic speed...

Combining graphene, its sister material boron nitride and a nanoscale gold grating to create a new class of optical modulator. Credit: University of Manchester

Scientists at The University of Manchester have discovered a new method of creating optoelectronic circuits using graphene and other 2D material much smaller than their current counterparts. Optoelectronics, the technology that uses pulses of light rather than traditional electrical signals, is vital for telecommunication networks.
Modulators are important in optoelectronic circuits as they control the signals passed through optoelectronic devices. Previous attempts to create hybrid modulators incorporating graphene have yielded promising although limited results.

Writing in Nature Communications, researchers led by Professor Sasha ...

Polarised Raman spectroscopy results for TIPS pentacene sample. Comparison of measured (top) polarised Raman data with the best fitting simulated results (bottom). The intensities of the 1374 cm−1 and 1576 cm−1 modes measured with tilts of both 0° and 30° around the -axis are considered. In each plot the normalised intensity of the Raman peak is plotted against the polariser angle (θP) and analyser angle (θA).

New technology could revolutionize printed electronics by enabling high quality semiconducting molecular crystals to be directly spray-deposited on any surface. University of Surrey and National Physical Laboratory’s research allows to convert organic semiconducting inks into isolated crystals through a scalable process, suitable for a wide range of molecules...

Berkeley Lab researchers (from left) Kristin Persson, Gerbrand Ceder and Wenhao Sun used the Materials Project to reach a new understanding of metastable materials. Credit: Marilyn Chung, Berkeley Lab

Data-mining used to quantify thermodynamics for nearly 30,000 materials. They say diamonds are forever, but diamonds in fact are a metastable form of carbon that will slowly but eventually transform into graphite, another form of carbon. Berkeley Lab has now quantified the thermodynamic scale of metastability for almost 30,000 known materials. This paves the way for designing and making promising next-generation materials for use in everything from semiconductors to pharmaceuticals to steels...