Category Physics

New memory survives temperatures hotter than lava

Novel memory chip survives temperatures hotter than lava
Gra/HfOx/W device and cross-section image. a, optical image of a single device with ~1 um ×1 um device size. b, cross-section TEM image and EELS mapping of W, Hf and C elements. Credit: Science (2026). DOI: 10.1126/science.aeb9934

The electronics inside your phone, your car, and every satellite currently orbiting Earth share one critical weakness: heat. Push them past about 200 degrees Celsius and they start to fail. For decades, that thermal ceiling has been one of the hardest walls in engineering. Now a team at the University of Southern California may have just found a way around it.

In a study published in Science, researchers led by Joshua Yang, Arthur B...

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Placing battery tech directly on tissue to deliver lithium ions for targeted pain relief

The secret ingredient in a new biomedical device? Lithium-ion battery tech
A new study from the University of Chicago shows how an ingredient from lithium batteries could form the foundation of treatments for pain relief or other disorders. Above, a tiny, flexible patch that can be interfaced with neural tissue to reduce pain signaling. Credit: Chuanwang Yang

A new study from the University of Chicago taps an ingredient most often used in the lithium-ion batteries that power our devices to open new avenues in biomedical technology. Lithium plays vital roles in the body, but taking it orally can have unwanted side effects—so a pair of UChicago chemistry labs teamed up to find a way to deliver lithium only to the exact places where it’s needed.

Their study, published in Nature Materials, could be the foundation for future biomedical technologies to treat p...

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Silicon quantum computer performs logical operations for the first time

Logical operations are performed on a silicon quantum computer for the first time
The donor cluster and preparation of the logical states. Credit: Nature Nanotechnology (2026). DOI: 10.1038/s41565-026-02140-1

Silicon is ubiquitous in modern electronics, and now it is becoming increasingly useful in quantum computing. In particular, silicon’s compatibility with existing chip technology and its long coherence times in silicon-based spin qubits make it a promising material for scalable quantum computing. A new study, published in Nature Nanotechnology, has demonstrated silicon’s use in a logical quantum processor, representing the first of its kind.

A logical quantum processor in silicon
Quantum computers are highly sensitive to errors from environmental noise, creating hurdles for practical quantum computation...

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Holographic storage approach packs more data into the same space by encoding three properties of light

New holographic data storage approach packs more data into the same space
Researchers developed a holographic data storage approach that stores and retrieves information in three dimensions by combining the amplitude, phase and polarization properties of light. Credit: Xiaodi Tan, Fujian Normal University in China

Researchers have developed a holographic data storage approach that stores and retrieves information in three dimensions by combining three properties of light—amplitude, phase and polarization. By allowing more data to be stored in the same space, the new approach could help advance efforts to meet the growing global demand for data storage.

Holographic data storage uses laser light to store digital information inside a material...

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