news 2012

A completely new method of manufacturing the smallest structures in electronics could make their manufacture thousands of times quicker, allowing for cheaper semiconductors. Instead of starting from a silicon wafer or other substrate, as is usual today, researchers have made it possible for the structures to grow from freely suspended nanoparticles of gold in a flowing gas.

One of the most promising innovations of nanotechnology has been the ability to perform rapid nanofabrication using nanometer-scale tips. Heating such tips can dramatically increase fabrication speeds, but high speed and high temperature have been known to blunt their atomically sharp points. Now, research conducted by a team that included the University of Pennsylvania's Robert Carpick and Tevis Jacobs has created a new type of nano-tip for thermal processing, which is made entirely made out of diamond.

Electronic circuits are typically integrated in rigid silicon wafers, but flexibility opens up a wide range of applications. In a world where electronics are becoming more pervasive, flexibility is a highly desirable trait, but finding materials with the right mix of performance and manufacturing cost remains a challenge.

To build the computer chips of the future, designers will need to understand how an electrical charge behaves when it is confined to metal wires only a few atom-widths in diameter. Now, a team of physicists at McGill University, in collaboration with researchers at General Motors R&D, have shown that electrical current may be drastically reduced when wires from two dissimilar metals meet.

Posted under: Engineering , Environment , News Releases , Research , Science , Technology If two birds meet deep in the forest, does anybody hear? Until now, nobody did, unless an intrepid biologist was hiding underneath a bush and watching their behavior, or the birds happened to meet near a research monitoring station.

Computers may be getting faster every year, but those advances in computer speed could be dwarfed if their 1's and 0's were represented by bursts of light, instead of electricity. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have made an important advance in this frontier of photonics, fashioning the first all-optical photonic switch out of cadmium sulfide nanowires.

Analysis of data from the National Science Foundation's South Pole Telescope , for the first time, more precisely defines the period of cosmological evolution when the first stars and galaxies formed and gradually illuminated the universe. The data indicate that this period, called the epoch of reionization, was shorter than theorists speculated — and that it ended early.

A revolutionary tool created by scientists at the University of Sheffield has enabled researchers to analyse nanometer-sized devices without destroying them for the first time, opening the door to a new wave of technologies. The nuclear magnetic resonance apparatus - developed by the University's Department of Physics and Astronomy - will allow for further developments and new applications for nanotechnology which is increasingly used in harvesting solar energy, computing, communication developments and also in the medical field.

Heat transfer in everything from computer chips to powerplants could be improved through new analysis of surface textures. Cooling systems that use a liquid that changes phase - such as water boiling on a surface - can play an important part in many developing technologies, including advanced microchips and concentrated solar-power systems.

Theories of the primordial Universe predict the existence of knots in the fabric of space - known as cosmic textures - which could be identified by looking at light from the cosmic microwave background (CMB), the relic radiation left over from the Big Bang. Using data from NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) satellite, researchers from UCL, Imperial College London and the Perimeter Institute have performed the first search for textures on the full sky, finding no evidence for such knots in space.

High-temperature superconductivity doesn't happen all it once. It starts in isolated nanoscale patches that gradually expand until they take over. That discovery, from atomic-level observations at Cornell and the University of Tokyo, offers a new insight into the puzzling "pseudogap" state observed in high-temperature superconductors; it may be another step toward creating new materials that superconduct at temperatures high enough to revolutionize electrical engineering.

Invisibility, once the subject of magic or legend, is slowly becoming reality. Over the past five years mathematicians and other scientists have been working on devices that enable invisibility cloaks – perhaps not yet concealing Harry Potter, but at least shielding small objects from detection by microwaves or sound waves.

Graphene is the wonder material that could solve the problem of making ever faster computers and smaller mobile devices when current silicon microchip technology hits an inevitable wall. Graphene, a single layer of carbon atoms in a tight hexagonal arrangement, has been highly researched because of its incredible electronic properties, with theoretical speeds 100 times greater than silicon.

The first purely silicon oxide-based 'Resistive RAM' memory chip that can operate in ambient conditions - opening up the possibility of new super-fast memory - has been developed by researchers at UCL. Resistive RAM (or 'ReRAM') memory chips are based on materials, most often oxides of metals, whose electrical resistance changes when a voltage is applied - and they "remember" this change even when the power is turned off.

Researchers have now shown that quantum light sources can be fabricated using silicon, the most widely used material underpinning modern electronics. Shown here is a silicon photonic chip containing several dozen devices designed and fabricated by graduate students at the Electrical and Computer Engineering department at UC San Diego.

Two lamps are brighter than one. This simple truism does not necessarily apply to lasers, as a team of scientists, led by the Vienna University of Technology found out. When one laser is shining and next to it another laser is turned on gradually, complex interactions between the two lasers can lead to a total shutdown and no light is emitted anymore.

McGill team examines the practice of prescribing medications for indications that have not received regulatory approval from Health Canada A new McGill University study evaluating off-label prescribing of medications by primary care physicians in Quebec suggests the practice is common, although it varies by medication, patient and physician characteristics.

By Simon Levey Friday 30 March 2012 Scientists have taken an important step forward in developing a new material using nano-sized magnets that could ultimately lead to new types of electronic devices, with greater processing capacity than is currently feasible. Many modern data storage devices, like hard disk drives, rely on the ability to manipulate the properties of tiny individual magnetic sections, but their overall design is limited by the way these magnetic 'domains' interact when they are close together.

Reception and service at central level for international students after arrival at KTH. For Master's students For Exchange students At the KTH Symposium, the director of the U.S. National Science Foundation explains how scientific co-operation with Sweden benefits American research.

Despite Australia's critical shortage of skilled workers, many trade apprentices are living on a wage that falls below the poverty line and is barely higher than the unemployment benefit, according to research from the University of Sydney's Workplace Research Centre (WRC). The Electrical Trades Union (ETU) has commissioned researchers from the WRC to prepare a report on the work, wages and living standards of electrical apprentices as part of Fair Work Australia's review of modern awards.