Category Technology/Electronics

A powerful new 4D printing technique could one day allow manufacturers to produce electronic devices and their wiring in a single process. Credit: H. Jerry Qi

Scientists report that they have developed a powerful new printer that could streamline the creation of self-assembling structures that can change shape after being exposed to heat and other stimuli. They say this unique technology could accelerate the use of 4D printing in aerospace, medicine and other industries. “We are on the cusp of creating a new generation of devices that could vastly expand the practical applications for 3D and 4D printing,” H. Jerry Qi, Ph.D., says. “Our prototype printer integrates many features that appear to simplify and expedite the processes used in traditional 3D printing...

NTU ground glass camera can take images in multispectrum, with potential uses in chemical sensing and food safety. Credit: Image courtesy of Nanyang Technological University

A new camera technology developed by scientists from NTU Singapore can take sharp, colour images without using a lens and colour filters. Using only a piece of ground glass and a monochrome sensor, the scientists created multi-coloured images by ‘reverse engineering’ the light that is scattered by the translucent matt surface of the ground glass, thus obtaining the original image that was projected on to it.

Since different wavelengths of light are scattered differently by the ground glass, the NTU scientists created an algorithm to reconstruct the image...

This is the target chamber (front) and ultra-high intensity laser (back) used in the micro-scale fusion experiment at Colorado State University. Credit: Advanced Beam Laboratory/Colorado State University

Record-setting efficiency for generation of neutrons. Nuclear fusion, the process that powers our sun, happens when nuclear reactions between light elements produce heavier ones. It’s also happening – at a smaller scale – in a Colorado State University laboratory. Using a compact but powerful laser to heat arrays of ordered nanowires, CSU scientists and collaborators have demonstrated micro-scale nuclear fusion in the lab. They have achieved record-setting efficiency for the generation of neutrons – chargeless sub-atomic particles resulting from the fusion process.

Laser-driven controlled ...

A single circuit board, foreground, that when joined with others forms the experimental array of the quadrupole topological insulator. Credit: L. Brian Stauffer

Researchers have produced a “human scale” demonstration of a new phase of matter called quadrupole topological insulators that was recently predicted using theoretical physics. These are the first experimental findings to validate this theory. The team’s work with QTIs was born out of the decade-old understanding of the properties of a class of materials called topological insulators...