Category Technology/Electronics

Medicinal microrobots could help physicians better treat and prevent diseases. But most of these devices are made with synthetic materials that trigger immune responses in vivo. Now, for the first time, researchers reporting in ACS Central Science have used lasers to precisely control neutrophils — a type of white blood cell — as a natural, biocompatible microrobot in living fish. The “neutrobots” performed multiple tasks, showing they could someday deliver drugs to precise locations in the body.

Microrobots currently in development for medical applications would require in...

Researchers at Simon Fraser University have made a crucial breakthrough in the development of quantum technology.

Their research, published in Nature today, describes their observations of over 150,000 silicon ‘T centre’ photon-spin qubits, an important milestone that unlocks immediate opportunities to construct massively scalable quantum computers and the quantum internet that will connect them.

Quantum computing has enormous potential to provide computing power well beyond the capabilities of today’s supercomputers, which could enable advances in many other fields, including chemistry, materials science, medicine and cybersecurity.

In order to make this a reality, it is necessary to produce both stable, long-lived qubits that provide processing power, as well as the communi...

A thermoelectric metal oxide film with a thermoelectric figure of merit of ~0.55 at 600°C has been discovered, opening new avenues towards the widespread use of thermoelectric converters.

Waste heat is a very promising source of energy conservation and reuse, by means of converting this heat into electricity — a process called thermoelectric conversion.

Commercially available thermoelectric conversion devices are synthesized using rare metals. While these are quite efficient, they are expensive and, in the majority of cases, utilize toxic materials...

What if you could power the smart thermostats, speakers and lights in your home with a kitchen countertop? Stones, such as marble and granite, are natural, eco-friendly materials that many people building or renovating houses already use. Now, in a step toward integrating energy storage with these materials, researchers have fabricated microsupercapacitors onto the surface of stone tiles. The devices, reported in ACS Nano, are durable and easily scaled up for customizable 3D power supplies.

It would be convenient if the surfaces in rooms could charge smart home devices or other small electronics without being connected ...