University of Illinois engineer Milton Feng and his team have introduced an upgrade to transistor lasers that could boost computer processor speeds. Credit: Photo by L. Brian Stauffer

Engineers are unveiling an upgrade to the transistor laser that could be used to boost computer processor speeds – the formation of two stable energy states and the ability to switch between them quickly. Modern computers are limited by a delay formed as electrons travel through the tiny wires and switches on a computer chip. To overcome this electronic backlog, engineers would like to develop a computer that transmits information using light, in addition to electricity, because light travels faster than electricity.

Having two stable energy states, or bistability, within a transistor allows the device to for...

PSI researcher Claire Villevieille, head of the Battery Materials Group, at the instrument for X-ray diffraction. Credit: Paul Scherrer Institute/Markus Fischer

PSI, Switzerland and Université Grenoble Alpes (France) researchers have developed a method that could enable a breakthrough for the lithium-sulphur battery. In theory, these batteries can deliver considerably more energy than today’s conventional lithium-ion batteries, but current prototypes show a distinct loss of capacity after just a few charging cycles. So they are not yet fit for widespread use, for instance in electric vehicles. With their new method, the researchers were able to gain crucial insights into how the rapid capacity loss occurs...

Watch the evolution of a stealth CME in this simulation. Differential rotation creates a twisted mass of magnetic fields on the sun, which then pinches off and speeds out into space. The image of the sun is from NASA’s STEREO. Colored lines depict magnetic field lines, and the different colors indicate in which layers of the sun’s atmosphere they originate. The white lines become stressed and form a coil, eventually erupting from the sun. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/ARMS/Joy Ng, producer

A kind of solar storm has puzzled scientists for its lack of typical warning signs: They seem to come from nowhere, and scientists call them stealth CMEs. Now, scientists have developed a model simulating their evolution...

Konstantinos Giapis has shown how molecular oxygen may be produced on the surface of comets using lab experiments. He and his postdoctoral scholar Yunxi Yao fired high-speed water molecules (left) at oxidized silicon and iron surfaces, observing the production of a plume that included molecular oxygen. Oxygen atoms are red, and hydrogen, blue. Giapis says similar conditions exist on the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, where the European Space Agency’s Rosetta mission detected molecular oxygen.
Credit: Caltech

A Caltech chemical engineer has figured out how to explain a nagging mystery in space – why comets expel oxygen gas. The discovery that comets produce O2 – was announced in 2015 by researchers studying the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko with the Rosetta spacecraft...