science wire

Researchers at the University of Basel have succeeded in building protein gates for artificial nano-vesicles that become transparent only under specific conditions.

Nicola Spaldin, Professor for Material Theory at ETH Zurich, is being awarded the Körber Prize in Hamburg today.

Double quantum dot: The three lower and upper trap up to two individual electrons, the spin states of which form the quantum-mechanical information unit. The lateral act as sensors. (Image: University of Basel, Department of Physics) Calculation with electron spins in a quantum computer assumes that the spin states last for a sufficient period of time.

Media Releases Matter and Material Research Using Synchrotron Light Materials Research Researchers at the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) have succeeded in switching tiny, magnetic structures using laser light and tracking the change over time. In the process, a nanometre-sized area bizarrely reminiscent of the Batman logo appeared.

Bernd Nowack was recently admitted by Thomson Reuters, a provider of scientific online data-bases, to the circle of the world's most influential scientists in the field of environmental scienc-es. The Empa researcher investigates the environmental aspects of nanoparticles. A visit to St. Gallen.

Media Releases Matter and Material Materials Research Research Using Synchrotron Light New effect might be important for emergence of High-Temperature Superconductivity An international team of researchers from SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University (both California) and the Paul Scherrer Institute (Villigen, Switzerland) has observed a new, unexpected kind of behaviour in copper-based high-temperature superconductors - materials that are capable of conducting electric current without any loss when cooled to low enough temperatures.

Media Releases Research Using Synchrotron Light Large Scale Facilities Materials Research Matter and Material SwissFEL SwissFEL Experiments PSI researchers garner experience for SwissFEL experiments Aided by short laser flashes, researchers at the Paul Scherrer Institute have managed to temporarily change a material's properties to such a degree that they have - to a certain extent -created a new material.

Media Releases Research Using Synchrotron Light Materials Research Matter and Material Novel material shows properties necessary for spintronic devices The motion of electrons is at the heart of most electronic applications. However, in the quest for the next generation of devices, researchers are also interested in manipulating the electrons' spins - their traits that make them into tiny magnets.

Media Releases Research Using Synchrotron Light World-record resolution in tomography with hard X-rays Tomography enables the interior of a vast range of objects to be depicted in 3D - from cellular structures to technical appliances. Researchers from the Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI) have now devised a method that opens up new scales of tomographic imaging and will thus make the detailed study of representative volumes of biological tissue and materials science specimens possible in future.

EPFL scientists have come up with a "how-to manual" for making the most efficient optical graphene circuits possible. The procedure facilitates and accelerates technological development in this future field. The research has been published in the scientific journal "Nature Photonics." Thanks to its amazing properties, graphene hold great promise as the basis for new chips that are faster, better-performing and more compact.

Solar thermal panels developed at EPFL are are dressed up in unique and patented new materials. Researchers created a stronger black coating that retains its original color and thereby its absorption properties much longer than traditional panels. Like most elements of a building, the lifespan of a solar thermal panel is between 25 and 30 years.

Media Releases Large Scale Facilities Research Using Muons Research Using Neutrons Particle Physics Matter and Material Materials research, particle physics, molecular biology, archaeology - for the

Researchers at EPFL have managed to combine antennas and solar cells to work together with unprecedented efficiency in a near future. This is a first step towards more compact and more lightweight satellites. The technology could also be deployed in the autonomous antenna systems used in the aftermath of natural disasters.

One of the methods used for examining the molecules in a liquid consists in passing the fluid through a nano-sized hole so as to detect their passage. EPFL researchers have found a way to improve this technique by using a material with unique properties: graphene. If we wanted to count the number of people in a crowd, we could make on the fly estimates, very likely to be imprecise, or we could ask each person to pass through a turnstile.

Media Releases Research Using Neutrons Research Using Synchrotron Light Materials Research The project funded is to investigate how metallic materials behave under complex strain and thus yield clues for the development of improved materials. Helena Van Swygenhoven, materials researcher at the Paul Scherrer Institute and professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL), has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant.

Media Releases Energy and Environment Lithium-ion batteries are high performance energy storage devices used in many commercial electronic appliances. Certainly, they can store a large amount of energy in a relatively small volume. They have also previously been widely believed to exhibit no memory effect.

Media Releases Matter and Material Research Using Synchrotron Light PSI-Scientists demonstrate: Magnetic interactions are of fundamental importance for iron-based high-temperature superconductors For a long time, scientists and engineers have longed for a material that would conduct electricity at room temperature without any losses.

Media Releases X-rays allow an inside look at structures that cannot be imaged using visible light. They are used to investigate nanoscale structures of objects as varied as single cells or magnetic storage media. Yet, high-resolution images impose extreme constraints on both the X ray microscope and the samples under investigation.

A bridge with a balsa wood core was built in Bex, Switzerland. The prefabricated bridge deck was mounted in a single day.

Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) researchers have investigated how they could make the semiconductor Germanium emit laser light. As a laser material, Germanium together with Silicon could form the basis for innovative computer chips in which information would be transferred partially in the form of light.

An American-Swiss research team has used a new X-ray technique at Swiss Light Source (SLS) of the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) to investigate the magnetic properties of atomically thin layers of a parent compound of a high-temperature superconductor. It turns out that the magnetic properties of such thin films differ by only a surprisingly small degree from those of macroscopically thick samples.

Nitto Denko Corporation, one of Japan's largest materials manufacturers, has announced today the establishment of a research and development unit in EPFL's Innovation Square in Lausanne, Switzerland.

An electron has been observed to decay into two separate parts, each carrying a particular property of the electron: a spinon carrying its spin - the property making the electron behave as a tiny compass needle - and an orbiton carrying its orbital moment - which arises from the electron's motion around the nucleus.

Silicon Filaments in Silicon Oxide for Next-Generation Photovoltaics. The group of Christophe Ballif (PV-LAB - Photovoltaics and Thin Film Electronics Laboratory ) demonstrate, on the basis of advanced TEM techniques, a new, mixed phase Si/SiO2 material, which they call filamentous SiOx.

Researchers have given pinewood the hardness and smooth touch of precious wood. L'EPFL+ECAL Lab presents the first objects made of this new material in Helsinki today.

A cobalt complex redox shuttle for dye-sensitized solar cells with high open-circuit potentials. Dye-sensitized solar cells are a promising alternative to traditional inorganic semiconductor-based solar cells.

EPFL's Laboratory of Composite and Polymer Technology is participating in HIVOCOMP, an EU program to develop innovative materials for the automotive industry.

Do better with less. That is the challenge the researchers from EPFL have set for themselves. Their specialty: manufacturing solar cells that are one thousand times thinner than conventional cells.

IBM and ETH Zurich to open the Binnig and Rohrer Nanotechnology Center located on the campus of IBM Research - Zurich.

Zurich, Switzerland, 22 Feb 2011 —In 1956, IBM chose to establish its European lab in Zurich for several reasons, including close access to some of the best talent and skills in the world.

Many important materials are composed of several phases - regions that differ in structure or chemical composition. When such a material is heated, atoms move from one phase to another, which changes the distribution of the phases - and thus, the properties of the material. Researchers from Northwestern University in the USA, the Paul Scherrer Institute, and Risø National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy in Denmark have now shown that for an important case, there is a general law describing this process that is valid for all classes of materials - including metals and polymers.

Semiconductors made from polymer materials are becoming increasingly important for the electronics industry - as a basis for transistors, solar cells or LEDs - showing important advantages when compared to conventional materials: they are lightweight, flexible and very cheap to produce. Usually, they consist of more than one substance as they get their particular electric properties only when several materials are blended.

Metallic glass Metallic glass is a hot topic in the field of materials science. Only since the early 1990s, says Jörg Löffler, could metallic glasses be produced in larger dimensions and be used as engineering material in the form of 'bulk metallic glasses'.