Mechanical properties of atomically thin boron nitride and the role of interlayer interactions. Nature Communications, 2017; 8: 15815 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms15815

A stretchy miracle material has been discovered that could be used to create highly resistant smart devices and scratch-proof paint for cars. Led by Dr Elton Santos from the University’s School of Mathematics and Physics, an international team have found superlubricity in a few layers of graphene – a concept where friction vanishes or very nearly vanishes. They also found that a few layers of hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) are as strong as diamond but are more flexible, cheaper and lighter...

Stereolithographic Printing of Ionically-Crosslinked Alginate Hydrogels for Degradable Biomaterials and Microfluidics. Lab Chip, 2017; DOI: 10.1039/C7LC00694B

Brown University engineers have demonstrated a technique for making 3D-printed biomaterials that can degrade on demand, which can be useful in making intricately patterned microfluidic devices or in making cell cultures than can change dynamically during experiments. “It’s a bit like Legos,” said Ian Wong, an assistant professor in Brown’s School of Engineering and co-author of the research. “We can attach polymers together to build 3D structures, and then gently detach them again under biocompatible conditions.”

They made their new degradable structures using a type of 3D printing called stereolithography...

Wave structure in Saturn’s rings known as the Janus 2:1 spiral density wave Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute

This view from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft shows a wave structure in Saturn’s rings known as the Janus 2:1 spiral density wave. Resulting from the same process that creates spiral galaxies, spiral density waves in Saturn’s rings are much more tightly wound. In this case, every second wave crest is actually the same spiral arm which has encircled the entire planet multiple times. This is the only major density wave visible in Saturn’s B ring. Most of the B ring is characterized by structures that dominate the areas where density waves might otherwise occur, but this innermost portion of the B ring is different.

The radius from Saturn at which the wave originates (toward...

Northern lights as seen over Norway. Credit: Jan R. Olsen

Jonathan Ng, a Princeton University graduate student at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), has for the first time applied a fluid simulation to the space plasma process behind solar flares, northern lights and space storms. The model could lead to improved forecasts of space weather that can shut down cell phone service and damage power grid, and better understanding of the hot, charged plasma gas that fuels fusion reactions.

The new simulation captures the physics of magnetic reconnection, the breaking apart and snapping together of the magnetic field lines in plasma that occurs throughout the universe...