Category Physics

Credit: ORNL An ORNL study found that complex oxide materials can self-organize into electrical circuits, which creates the possibility for new types of computer chips.

Researchers studying nanoscale materials at the Dept of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Lab have uncovered remarkable behavior that could advance microprocessors beyond today’s silicon-based chips. A single crystal complex oxide material, when confined to micro- and nanoscales, can act like a multi-component electrical circuit. This behavior stems from an unusual feature of certain complex oxides called phase separation, in which tiny regions in the material exhibit different electronic and magnetic properties.

It means individual nanoscale regions in complex oxide materials can behave as self-organized circuit elements, which ...

The new material comprising tin, iodine and phosphorus possesses a double helix structure which provides the semiconductor with extreme mechanical flexibility. Credit: Prof. Tom Nilges / TUM

New flexible semiconductor for electronics, solar technology and photo catalysis. It is the double helix, with its stable and flexible structure of genetic information, that made life on Earth possible in the first place. Now a team from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has discovered a double helix structure in an inorganic material. The material called SnIP, comprising tin (Sn), iodine (I) and phosphorus(P) is a semiconductor with extraordinary optical and electronic properties, and extreme mechanical flexibility.The centimeter-long fibers can be arbitrarily bent without breaking.

“This prope...

A schematic (left) and photograph (right) of a photonic dew point temperature sensor developed by Ji Fang Tao and co-workers, which works by detecting changes in the refraction of light as water molecules condense onto the device. (left) © 2015 IEEE. Reprinted, with permission, from Ref 1. (right) © 2016 A*STAR Institute of Microelectronics

Electromagnetic waves created on a layer of organic molecules could provide the perfect on-chip light source for future quantum communication systems...

A piece of fabric was woven with special strands of material that harvest electricity from the sun and motion. Credit: Georgia Tech

Georgia Institute of Tech researchers have developed a fabric that can simultaneously harvest energy from both sunshine and motion. Combining two types of electricity generation into one textile paves the way for developing garments that could provide their own source of energy to power devices such as smart phones or GPS. “This hybrid power textile presents a novel solution to charging devices in the field from something as simple as the wind blowing on a sunny day,” said Prof. Zhong Lin Wang.

To make the fabric, Wang’s team used a commercial textile machine to weave together solar cells constructed from lightweight polymer fibers with fiber-based triboelectr...