Category Chemistry/Nanotechnology

Washington State University researchers have developed a low-cost, portable laboratory on a smartphone that can analyze several samples at once to catch a cancer biomarker, producing lab quality results. Credit: Washington State University

Researchers have developed a low-cost, portable laboratory on a smartphone that can analyze several samples at once to catch a cancer biomarker, producing lab quality results. At a time when patients and medical professionals expect always faster results, researchers are trying to translate biodetection technologies used in laboratories to the field and clinic, so patients can get nearly instant diagnoses in a physician’s office, ambulance or emergency room.

The WSU research team created an 8 channel smartphone spectrometer that can detect human interleu...

(a) Crystal structure of MoS2: S atoms in gold and Mo in black with unit cell parameter a and b, (b) top view of a single-layer MoS2 structure in honeycomb shape; (c) HRTEM of 2H-MoS2 (top insert is the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) image showing the planes; slight distortion is due to the tilting of the flake in the TEM; a1, a2 and a3 presented HRTEM image is the Mo-Mo interatomic distance of 2.8 Å for 2H-MoS2 (d–e) schematic of the indirect electron transition in bulk MoS2 and direct electron transition in single layer MoS2 respectively.

A research team at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) has developed a revolutionary, light-activated semiconductor nanocomposite material that can be used in a variety of applications, including microscopic actuators and grippers for surgical robots...

Los Alamos Center for Advanced Solar Photophysics researchers hold a large prototype solar window. From left to right: Jaehoon Lim, Kaifeng Wu, Victor Klimov, Hongbo Li. Credit: Los Alamos National Laboratory

Los Alamos National Lab team demonstrates an important step in taking quantum dot, solar-powered windows from the laboratory to the construction site by proving that the technology can be scaled up from palm-sized demonstration models to windows large enough to put in and power a building. “We are developing solar concentrators that will harvest sunlight from building windows and turn it into electricity, using quantum-dot based luminescent solar concentrators (LSCs),” said lead scientist Victor Klimov.

LSCs are light-management devices that can serve as large-area sunlight collectors...

A: 3D scaffold of the microbattery machined in a silicon substrate to form double microtubes. B: schematic of a 3D Li-ion microbattery showing the stacking of materials deposited in thin layers using ALD. C: Transmission electron microscopy analysis of thin film coatings

In the race towards miniaturization, a French-US team has succeeded in improving the energy density of a rechargeable battery without increasing its size (limited to a few square millimeters in mobile sensors). This feat was achieved by developing a 3D structure made of microtubes, the first step towards producing a complete microbattery. The first experiments have demonstrated the excellent conductivity of the battery’s solid electrolyte/.

In the era of connected devices, intelligent connected microsensors require miniatu...