Category Chemistry/Nanotechnology

Flexible OLED light sources on transparent electrodes developed within TREASORES. These OLEDs were made by Fraunhofer FEP using a roll-to-roll process. Credit: Fraunhofer FEP

In >3yrs of work, European scientists have finally made future lighting technology ready to market. They developed flexible lighting foils that can be produced roll-to-roll. These devices pave the path towards cheaper solar cells and LED lighting panels. Project TREASORES was lead by Empa scientist Frank Nüesch and combined knowhow from 9 companies and 6 research institutes in 5 european countries.

In Nov 2012, the TREASORES project (Transparent Electrodes for Large Area Large Scale Production of Organic Optoelectronic Devices) started with the aim of developing technologies to dramatically reduce the production cost...

Dr Shakil Awan, Lecturer in the School of Computing, Electronics and Mathematics at Plymouth University, said:
Our results for the first time not only confirm the theoretical properties of graphene but also open up many new applications of the material in high-speed electronics and bio-sensing
Dr Awan (pictured right) uses a Cascade probe station and Keysight Parameter Analyser in the Wolfson Nanomaterials and Devices Laboratory in Plymouth

Now research has shown graphene out-performs any other known material, including superconductors, when carrying high-frequency electrical signals compared to direct current, essentially transmitting signals without any additional energy loss...

Rotor mechanism assembled from 3-D DNA components. Dietz Lab/TUM

In the 1st machine, a rotor mechanism was formed from interlocking 3D DNA components. Another has a hinged molecular manipulator, also made from DNA. These are just the latest steps in a campaign to transform so-called “DNA origami” into an industrially useful, commercially viable technology.

Inspired by nature’s nanomachines – such as the enzyme ATP synthase and the motor-driven flagella of bacteria – physicists in Prof. Hendrik Dietz’s lab at TUM keep expanding their own design and construction repertoire. They have systematically developed rules and procedures for creating self-assembled DNA origami structures with ever greater flexibility and control...

3D graphene created by an international research team led by Unversity at Buffalo engineers. Credit: University at Buffalo.

The structures could be an important step toward making graphene commercially viable in electronics, medical diagnostic devices and other industries. Discovered in 2004, it is 1 million times thinner than a human hair, 300X stronger than steel and it’s the best known conductor of heat and electricity. These qualities could, among other things, make computers faster, batteries more powerful and solar panels more efficient. But the material is tough to manipulate beyond its 2D form.

Recently, scientists poured graphene oxide suspension, a gel-like form of the material, into freezing molds to create 3D objects...