New software simulates complex wave scattering for metamaterial design. Could invisibility cloaks become a reality? New research brings this science fiction concept a step closer, with a breakthrough software package that simulates how waves interact with complex materials.

A new software package developed by researchers at Macquarie University can accurately model the way waves — sound, water or light — are scattered when they meet complex configurations of particles.

This will vastly improve the ability to rapidly design metamaterials — exciting artificial materials used to amplify, block or deflect waves.

The findings, published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A on 19 June 2024, demonstrated the use of TMATSOLVER — a multipole-based tool that models interac...

Researchers have invented a technique that enables low Earth orbit satellite antennas to manage signals for multiple users at once, slashing costs and simplifying designs for communication satellites.

Low-orbit satellites could soon offer millions of people worldwide access to high-speed communications, but the satellites’ potential has been stymied by a technological limitation – their antenna arrays can only manage one user at a time.

The one-to-one ratio means that companies must launch either constellations of many satellites, or large individual satellites with many arrays, to provide wide coverage. Both options are expensive, technically complex, and could lead to overcrowded orbits.

For example, SpaceX went the “constellation” route...

Mouse study finds fathers on unhealthy diets can cause cardiovascular disease in their daughters. When they become fathers, men who have an unhealthy, high-cholesterol diet can cause increased risk of cardiovascular disease, or CVD, in their daughters, a University of California, Riverside-led mouse study has found.

The research, published in the journal JCI Insight, is the first to demonstrate this result seen only in female offspring.

CVD, the leading cause of death globally, is a group of disorders that affects the heart and blood vessels. Hypertension (high blood pressure) is a leading risk factor for CVD...

Newly discovered role of phase separation can help develop memory devices for energy-efficient AI computing. Phase separation, when molecules part like oil and water, works alongside oxygen diffusion to help memristors — electrical components that store information using electrical resistance — retain information even after the power is shut off, according to a University of Michigan led study recently published in Matter.

Up to this point, explanations have not fully grasped how memristors retain information without a power source, known as nonvolatile memory, because models and experiments do not match up.

“While experiments have shown devices can retain information for over 10 years, the models used in the community show that information can only be retained for a few hours,”...