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    Category Physics

    Reaching out to Stars beyond our Galaxy

    March 8, 2016, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    Scientists stand on a platform at the world's largest underground neutrino detector Super Kamiokande located 1km underneath the mountain in central Japan. Credit: Copyright : Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe

    Scientists stand on a platform at the world’s largest underground neutrino detector Super Kamiokande located 1km underneath the mountain in central Japan. Credit: Copyright : Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe

    An international team in Japan is getting ready to power up a 50,000-ton neutrino detector by adding a single metal, which will turn it into the world’s first detector capable of analysing exploding stars beyond the immediate neighbourhood of the Milky Way. Neutrinos are relics from supernovae,. They are so tiny and interact so weakly that every second, trillions of them manage to pass through human bodies without anyone noticing. Studying them can reveal details about how stars in the universe, like our sun, work.

    The problem is that all supernova neutri...

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    Nanoscale Mirrored Cavities Amplify, Connect Quantum Memories

    March 6, 2016, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    Nanoscale mirrored cavities amplify, connect quantum memories

    Building quantum memories on a chip: Diamond photonic crystal cavities (ladder-like structures) are integrated on a silicon substrate. Green laser light (green arrow) excites electrons on impurity atoms trapped within the cavities, picking up information about their spin states, which can then be read out as red light (red arrow) emitted by photoluminescence from the cavity. The inset shows the nitrogen-vacancy (NV)-nanocavity system, where a nitrogen atom (N) is substituted into the diamond crystal lattice in place of a carbon atom (gray balls) adjacent to a vacancy (V). Layers of diamond and air keep light trapped within these cavities long enough to interact with the nitrogen atom’s spin state and transfer that information via the emitted light. Credit: MIT

    The idea of computing systems...

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    Technological Breakthrough for Cheaper Lighting, Flexible Solar Cells

    March 5, 2016, Categories  Technology/Electronics, Chemistry/Nanotechnology, Physics

    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

    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...

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    Electricity can flow through Graphene at High Frequencies Without Energy Loss

    March 5, 2016, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics, Chemistry/Nanotechnology

    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

    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...

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