Scientist from the Niels Bohr Institute at University of Copenhagen and from Harvard University have worked out a new theory which describe how the necessary transistors for the quantum computers of the future may be created. The research has just been published in the scientific journal Nature Physics.
Researchers dream of quantum computers. Incredibly fast super computers which can solve such extremely complicated tasks that it will revolutionise the application possibilities. But there are some serious difficulties. One of them is the transistors, which are the systems that process the signals.
A nanoparticle drug delivery system designed for brain tumor therapy has shown promising tumor cell selectivity in a novel cell culture model devised by University of Nottingham scientists.
The nanoparticles used in this study were prepared from a novel biodegradable polymer poly(glycerol adipate). The polymer has been further modified to enhance incorporation of drugs and make the nanoparticles more effective.
Placing a film of silicon nanoparticles onto a silicon solar cell can boost power, reduce heat and prolong the cell’s life, researchers now report.
“Integrating a high-quality film of silicon nanoparticles 1 nanometer in size directly onto silicon solar cells improves power performance by 60 percent in the ultraviolet range of the spectrum,” said Munir Nayfeh, a physicist at the University of Illinois and corresponding author of a paper accepted for publication in Applied Physics Letters. (more…)
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed a new energy storage device that easily could be mistaken for a simple sheet of black paper.
The nanoengineered battery is lightweight, ultra thin, completely flexible, and geared toward meeting the trickiest design and energy requirements of tomorrow’s gadgets, implantable medical equipment, and transportation vehicles.
A vaccine against anthrax that is more effective and easier to administer than the present vaccine has proved highly effective in tests in mice and guinea pigs, report University of Michigan Medical School scientists in the August issue of Infection and Immunity.
The scientists were able to trigger a strong immune response by treating the inside of the animals’ noses with a “nanoemulsion” – a suspension of water, soybean oil, alcohol and surfactant emulsified to create droplets of only 200 to 300 nanometers in size. It would take about 265 of the droplets lined up side by side to equal the width of a human hair.
By using pulses of light to dramatically accelerate quantum computers, University of Michigan researchers have made strides in technology that could foil national and personal security threats.
It’s a leap, they say, that could lead to tougher protections of information and quicker deciphering of hackers’ encryption codes.
A new process for adjusting the resistance of semiconductor devices by carpeting a small area of the device with tiny pits, like a yard dug up by demented terriers, may be the key to a new class of magnetic sensors, enabling new, ultra-dense data storage devices. The technique demonstrated by researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)* allows engineers to tailor the electrical resistance of individual layers in a device without changing any other part of the processing or design.
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed a reliable, reproducible method for parallel fabrication of multiple nanogap electrodes, a development crucial to the creation of mass-produced nanoscale electronics.
A nanoscopic ‘”resonator”‘ that could form the building blocks forof the logic gates inside an electromechanical computer has been developed by US researchers.
Sotiris Masmanidis at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena and colleagues suggest that computers constructed from nanoscale electromechanical components could be more efficient and robust than purely electronic computers.
The resonator consists of a piece of gallium arsenide crystal 4 micrometres long, 0.8 micrometres wide and 0.2 micrometres deep, attached to a base. One side of the crystal “beam” is doped to provide extra electrons, while the other is doped so that it lacks them. When an alternating current (AC) voltage is applied across the post, an electric field is formed across the centre of the bar. A piezoelectric effect then kicks in, causing the gallium arsenide crystal to deform. If the AC voltage has the right frequency, the bar will resonate, vibrating like a metal bar after being struck.
Devices made from plastic semiconductors, like solar cells and light-emitting diodes (LEDs), could be improved based on information gained using a new nanoparticle technique developed at The University of Texas at Austin.
We are approaching an evolutionary event horizon, where the organic and the synthetic, the virtual and the “real”, are merging together into an operational ecology, an existence morphology for which there is no precendent in the history of which we are currently aware, catalyzed by nanotechnology
Researchers from the University of Delaware and Washington University in St. Louis have figured out how to train synthetic polymer molecules to behave–to literally “self-assemble” –and form into long, multicompartment cylinders 1,000 times thinner than a human hair, with potential uses in radiology, signal communication and the delivery of therapeutic drugs in the human body. The discovery, a fundamental new tool for nanotechnology, is reported in the Aug. 3 issue of the prestigious journal ‘Science.’
In an assist in the quest for ever smaller electronic devices, Duke University engineers have adapted a decades-old computer aided design and manufacturing process to reproduce nanosize structures with features on the order of single molecules.
The new automated technique for nanomanufacturing suggests that the emerging nanotechnology industry might capitalize on skills already mastered by today’s engineering workforce, according to the researchers.
When it comes to searching out cancer cells, gold may turn out to be a precious metal.
Purdue University researchers have created gold nanoparticles that are capable of identifying marker proteins on breast cancer cells, making the tiny particles a potential tool to better diagnose and treat cancer. The technology would be about three times cheaper than the most common current method and has the potential to provide many times the quantity and quality of data, said Joseph Irudayaraj, an associate professor of agricultural and biological engineering.
In recent years, Americans have been intrigued by the promise of hydrogen-powered vehicles. But experts have judged that several technology problems must be resolved before they are more than a novelty.
Recently, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory have used their insights into nanomaterials to create bendy hydrogen sensors, which are at the heart of hydrogen fuel cells used in hydrogen vehicles.
