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    Research leads to a Golden Discovery for Wearable Technology

    March 17, 2017, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics, Chemistry/Nanotechnology

    An example of a gold foil peeled from single crystal silicon. Credit: Reprinted with permission from Naveen Mahenderkar et al., Science [355]:[1203] (2017)

    An example of a gold foil peeled from single crystal silicon.
    Credit: Reprinted with permission from Naveen Mahenderkar et al., Science [355]:[1203] (2017)

    Some day, your smartphone might completely conform to your wrist, and when it does, it might be covered in pure gold, thanks to researchers at Missouri University of Science and Technology. They have developed a way to “grow” thin layers of gold on single crystal wafers of silicon, remove the gold foils, and use them as substrates on which to grow other electronic materials. This could revolutionize wearable or “flexible” technology research, greatly improving versatility of electronics in the future.

    Most research into wearable technology has been done using polymer substrates, or substrates made up of multiple crystals...

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    Scientists Identify a Black Hole Choking on Stardust

    March 17, 2017, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    In this artist's rendering, a thick accretion disk has formed around a supermassive black hole following the tidal disruption of a star that wandered too close. Stellar debris has fallen toward the black hole and collected into a thick chaotic disk of hot gas. Flashes of X-ray light near the center of the disk result in light echoes that allow astronomers to map the structure of the funnel-like flow, revealing for the first time strong gravity effects around a normally quiescent black hole. Credit: NASA/Swift/Aurore Simonnet, Sonoma State University

    In this artist’s rendering, a thick accretion disk has formed around a supermassive black hole following the tidal disruption of a star that wandered too close. Stellar debris has fallen toward the black hole and collected into a thick chaotic disk of hot gas. Flashes of X-ray light near the center of the disk result in light echoes that allow astronomers to map the structure of the funnel-like flow, revealing for the first time strong gravity effects around a normally quiescent black hole. Credit: NASA/Swift/Aurore Simonnet, Sonoma State University

    Data suggest black holes swallow stellar debris in bursts...

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    Gigantic Jupiter-type Planet reveals Insights into how Planets Evolve

    March 17, 2017, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    An image of the HD 106906 stellar debris disk, created by Erika Nesvold's simulation, showing the ring of rocky and icy planet-forming material rotating around the star. (The star is removed from the image, masked by the black circle.) The different hues represent gradients of brightness in the disk material; yellow is the brightest and blue the dimmest. Credit: Erika Nesvold/Carnegie Institution for Science

    An image of the HD 106906 stellar debris disk, created by Erika Nesvold’s simulation, showing the ring of rocky and icy planet-forming material rotating around the star. (The star is removed from the image, masked by the black circle.) The different hues represent gradients of brightness in the disk material; yellow is the brightest and blue the dimmest. Credit: Erika Nesvold/Carnegie Institution for Science

    Astrophysicists get rare peek at a baby solar system 300 light-years away. An enormous young planet ~300 light-years from Earth has given astrophysicists a rare glimpse into planetary evolution. The planet, known as HD 106906b, was discovered in 2014 by a team of scientists from the U.S., the Netherlands and Italy...

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    Bowel Cancer Medication folinic acid, could help Combat Early-Onset Parkinson’s disease

    March 16, 2017, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    Folinic acid

    Folinic acid

    People with certain forms of early-onset Parkinson’s disease could potentially benefit from taking a medication used to treat certain forms of cancer, according to new research by University of Leicester scientists and funded by the Medical Research Council. The study suggests that folinic acid, used in medications to treat bowel cancer, can also protect neurons associated with Parkinson’s disease in fruit flies.

    Dr Miguel Martins, MRC Toxicology Unit at the University of Leicester explained: “Parkinson’s disease is a disabling disorder for which no cure is yet available; further, after dopaminergic neurons are lost, only a few palliative treatment options for Parkinson’s symptoms are available...

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