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Chemistry/Physics/Materials Sciences
Key: Meeting Journal Funder Dissertation
Public Release: 8-Feb-2010
Physical Review Letters
Extra large carbon
The nucleus of one form of carbon is much larger and more stable than expected.

Contact: James Riordon
riordon@aps.org
301-209-3238
American Physical Society

Public Release: 2-Feb-2010
Nature Physics
New neutron studies support magnetism's role in superconductors
Neutron scattering experiments performed at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory give strong evidence that, if superconductivity is related to a material's magnetic properties, the same mechanisms are behind both copper-based high-temperature superconductors and the newly discovered iron-based superconductors.

Contact: Bill Cabage
cabagewh@ornl.gov
865-574-4399
DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Public Release: 21-Jan-2010
Science
Watching crystals grow provides clues to making smoother, defect-free thin films
To make thin films for semiconductors in electronic devices, layers of atoms must be grown in neat, crystalline sheets. But while some materials grow smooth crystals, others tend to develop bumps and defects -- a serious problem for thin-film manufacturing. Cornell physicists shed new light on how atoms arrange themselves into thin films.
National Science Foundation, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Cornell University

Contact: Blaine Friedlander
bpf2@cornell.edu
607-254-8093
Cornell University

Public Release: 19-Jan-2010
Physical Review B
Turning down the noise in quantum data storage
Tripling the steps in a read cycle can significantly improve signal to noise ratios in quantum data storage.

Contact: James Riordon
riordon@aps.org
301-209-3238
American Physical Society

Public Release: 19-Jan-2010
Science Express
Data at the end of the tunnel
Researchers from Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin and the French research facility CNRS, south of Paris, are using electric fields to manipulate the property of electrons known as "spin" to store data permanently. This principle could not only improve random access memory in computers, it could also revolutionize the next generation of electronic devices.

Contact: Dr. Sergio Valencia Molina
sergio.valencia@helmholtz-berlin.de
49-306-392-5750
Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres

Public Release: 19-Jan-2010
Journal of Medical Microbiology
Painless plasma jets could replace dentist's drill
Plasma jets capable of obliterating tooth decay-causing bacteria could be an effective and less painful alternative to the dentist's drill, according to a new study published in the February issue of the Journal of Medical Microbiology.

Contact: Laura Udakis
l.udakis@sgm.ac.uk
44-118-988-1843
Society for General Microbiology

Public Release: 18-Jan-2010
Nature Nanotechnology
European collaboration makes breakthrough in developing super-material graphene
A collaborative research project has brought the world a step closer to producing a new material on which future nanotechnology could be based. Researchers across Europe, including the UK's National Physical Laboratory (NPL), have demonstrated how an incredible material, graphene, could hold the key to the future of high-speed electronics, such as micro-chips and touchscreen technology.

Contact: David Lewis
david@proofcommunication.com
084-568-01865
National Physical Laboratory

Public Release: 10-Jan-2010
Nature Chemistry
Quantum computer calculates exact energy of molecular hydrogen
In an important first for a promising new technology, scientists have used a quantum computer to calculate the precise energy of molecular hydrogen. This groundbreaking approach to molecular simulations could have profound implications not just for quantum chemistry, but also for a range of fields from cryptography to materials science.
US Army Research Office, Australian Research Council

Contact: Steve Bradt
steve_bradt@harvard.edu
617-496-8070
Harvard University

Public Release: 8-Jan-2010
Fermilab's NOvA Collaboration
Neutrino data to flow in 2010; NOvA scientists tune design
Physicists may see data by late summer from a prototype for a $278 million NOvA neutrino experiment that can yield clues to the universe's mysteries. Construction is underway on a 220-ton "integration prototype" detector and a larger 14,000-ton detector, a project of Fermilab and University of Minnesota. About 40 scientists will fine-tune design Jan. 8-10 at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, their first meeting since the US Department of Energy's October approval of "full construction start."
US Department of Energy

Contact: Kim Cobb
cobbk@mail.smu.edu
214-768-7654
Southern Methodist University

Public Release: 7-Jan-2010
Science
Golden ratio discovered in a quantum world
Researchers from the German Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie, in cooperation with colleagues from Oxford and Bristol Universities, as well as the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, UK, have for the first time observed a nanoscale symmetry hidden in solid state matter. They have measured the signatures of a symmetry showing the same attributes as the golden ratio famous from art and architecture. The research team is publishing these findings in Science Jan. 8.

Contact: Prof. Alan Tennant
tennant@helmholtz-berlin.de
49-308-062-2741
Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres

Public Release: 6-Jan-2010
Nature
Quantum simulation of a relativistic particle
Researchers of the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Informationin Innsbruck, Austria, used a calcium ion to simulate a relativistic quantum particle, demonstrating a phenomenon that has not been directly observable so far: the Zitterbewegung. They have published their findings in the current issue of the journal Nature.
Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austrian Science Funds, European Commission

Contact: Christian Roos
christian.roos@oeaw.ac.at
43-512-507-4728
University of Innsbruck

Public Release: 21-Dec-2009
Metrologica
From now on, 4 PTB primary atomic clocks will contribute to UTC
The new caesium fountain clock CSF2 is admitted into the exclusive international club of primary clocks.

Contact: Stefan Weyers
stefan.weyers@ptb.de
49-531-592-4416
Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB)

Public Release: 15-Dec-2009
European Physical Journal C
LHC produces first physics results
The first paper on proton collisions in the CERN Large Hadron Collider -- designed to provide the highest energy ever explored with particle accelerators -- is published online this week in Springer's European Physical Journal C. In November 2009, during the early commissioning of the CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) LHC two counter-rotating proton bunches were circulated concurrently for the first time in the machine.

Contact: Joan Robinson
joan.robinson@springer.com
49-622-148-78130
Springer

Public Release: 14-Dec-2009
Physical Review Letters
University of Toronto physicists lay the groundwork for cooler, faster computing
University of Toronto quantum optics researchers Sajeev John and Xun Ma have discovered new behaviors of light within photonic crystals that could lead to faster optical information processing and compact computers that don't overheat.
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, Ontario Premier's Platinum Research Fund

Contact: Sean Bettam
s.bettam@utoronto.ca
416-946-7950
University of Toronto

Public Release: 14-Dec-2009
Theorists propose a new way to shine -- and a new kind of star
Physicists propose there may be a new stage for some dying stars. Dubbed electroweak stars, they are fueled by the conversion of quarks to leptons, which prevents or staves off collapse into a black hole.

Contact: Kevin Mayhood
kevin.mayhood@case.edu
216-368-4442
Case Western Reserve University

Public Release: 11-Dec-2009
Science
Rice physicists find reappearing quantum trios
Using atoms at temperatures colder than deep space, Rice University physicists have delivered overwhelming proof for a 1970 theory that was largely scoffed at when it first appeared. In a paper available online in Science, Rice's team offers experimental proof of a universal quantum mechanism that causes trios of particles to appear and reappear at higher energy levels in an infinite progression. The triplets, or trimers, form in special cases where pairs cannot.
National Science Foundation, Office of Naval Research, Keck Foundation, Welch Foundation

Contact: Jade Boyd
jadeboyd@rice.edu
713-348-6778
Rice University

Public Release: 10-Dec-2009
New approach to emissions makes climate and air quality models more accurate, major study finds
It's no secret that the emissions leaving a car tailpipe or factory smokestack affect climate and air quality. Even trees release chemicals that influence the atmosphere. But until now, scientists have struggled to know where these organic molecules go and what happens to them once they leave their source, leading to models for predicting climate and air quality that are incomplete or less than accurate.
National Science Foundation, US Department of Energy, US Environmental Protection Agency

Contact: Jose-Luis Jimenez
Jose.Jimenez@Colorado.edu
303-492-3557
University of Colorado at Boulder

Public Release: 9-Dec-2009
Story tips from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory -- December 2009
Titanium dioxide can be converted into a material that absorbs sunlight and greatly increase the efficiency of solar energy cells. Coated particle fuel fabricated at ORNL, in cooperation with INL, General Atomics, and the Babcock & Wilcox Company, has set a world record for advanced high temperature gas-cooled reactor fuel. Electronic devices of the future may benefit from a fundamental discovery that allows researchers to customize the electronic properties of complex materials.

Contact: Ron Walli
wallira@ornl.gov
865-576-0226
DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Public Release: 7-Dec-2009
Physical Review Letters
Super cool atom thermometer
Physicists have devised a thermometer that can potentially measure temperatures as low as tens of trillionths of a degree above absolute zero.

Contact: James Riordon
riordon@aps.org
301-209-3238
American Physical Society

Public Release: 7-Dec-2009
Physical Review D
Hunt for Higgs boson: Mass of top quark narrows search
New high-energy particle research by a team working with data from Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory heightens uncertainty about the exact nature of a key theoretical component of modern physics -- the massive fundamental particle, the Higgs boson. Particle collision data resulting in two leptons helped improve measurements of the mass of the heavy subatomic top quark, which bears on the Higgs, says physicist Robert Kehoe at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, who led the team.
US Department of Energy

Contact: Kim Cobb
cobbk@mail.smu.edu
214-768-7654
Southern Methodist University

Public Release: 7-Dec-2009
Nature
Cosmic rays hunted down
Nearly 100 years after the discovery of cosmic rays, a new type of gamma ray telescope is finally allowing physicists to make images of sites of cosmic ray acceleration.

Contact: Diana Lutz
dlutz@wustl.edu
314-935-5272
Washington University in St. Louis

Public Release: 2-Dec-2009
Nature
JQI researchers create 'synthetic magnetic fields' for neutral atoms
Achieving an important new capability in ultracold atomic gases, researchers at the Joint Quantum Institute, a collaboration of the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University of Maryland, have created "synthetic" magnetic fields for ultracold gas atoms, in effect "tricking" neutral atoms into acting as if they are electrically charged particles subjected to a real magnetic field.

Contact: Ben Stein
bstein@nist.gov
301-975-3097
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

Public Release: 2-Dec-2009
Nature
Synthetic magnetism achieved by optical methods
Researchers have created "synthetic magnetism" using a technique that will enable unprecedented experiments into quantum effects and the behavior of condensed-matter systems. It overcomes a long-standing obstacle to the goal of using precision-controlled ultracold atom ensembles to model phenomena such as the quantum Hall effect.
US Office of Naval Research, US Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Army Research Office, National Science Foundation

Contact: Dr. Ian Spielman
ian.spielman@nist.gov
301-975-8664
University of Maryland

Public Release: 1-Dec-2009
Nano Letters
NIST researchers put a new spin on atomic musical chairs
Researchers from NIST and the Naval Research Laboratory have developed a new way to introduce magnetic impurities in a semiconductor crystal, a technique that will enable researchers to selectively implant atoms in a crystal one at a time to learn about its electrical and magnetic properties on the atomic scale.
Korea Research Foundation, US Office of Naval Research, NIST-CNST/UMD-NanoCenter Cooperative Agreement

Contact: Mark Esser
mark.esser@nist.gov
301-975-8735
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

Public Release: 29-Nov-2009
Nature Physics
Spinons -- confined like quarks
The concept of confinement is one of the central ideas in modern physics. The most famous example is that of quarks which bind together to form protons and neutrons. Now Prof. Bella Lake from Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin together with an international team of scientists report for the first time an experimental realization and a proof of confinement phenomenon observed in a condensed matter system.
US Department of Energy

Contact: Professor Bella Lake
bella.lake@helmholtz-berlin.de
49-308-062-2058
Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres