EurekAlert! InContext Modules

Public Release: 9-Jan-2013

ACS Nano
Chemical modules that mimic predator-prey and other behaviors
Scientists are reporting development of chemical modules that can reproduce, on an "unprecedented" molecular level, changes and interactions that occur in natural populations of plants and animals, including those of hunting and being hunted for food, conducting mutually beneficial relationships and competing for resources. The report on these new "predator-prey biochemical oscillators," which could become building blocks for molecular machines and computers, appears in ACS Nano.

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013

Physical Review Letters
Bottom-up approach provides first characterization of pyroelectric nanomaterials
By taking a "bottom-up" approach, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have observed for the first time that "size does matter," in regards "pyroelectricity," -- the current/voltage developed in response to temperature fluctuations that enables technologies such as infrared sensors, night-vision, and energy conversion units, to name a few.

Office of Naval Research, US Army Research Office, Air Force Office of Scientific Research

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013

Nature Communications
Counting the twists in a helical light beam
Applied physicists at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences have created a new device that has the potential to add capacity to future optical communications networks.

Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, National Science Foundation, Agency for Science, Technology, and Research in Singapore

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013

IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science
'Tricorder' invention could put medical diagnosis and terrorism prevention in the palm of the hand
The hand-held scanners, or tricorders, of the Star Trek movies and television series are one step closer to reality now that a University of Missouri engineering team has invented a compact source of X-rays and other forms of radiation. The radiation source, which is the size of a stick of gum, could be used to create inexpensive and portable X-ray scanners for use by doctors, as well as to fight terrorism and aid exploration on this planet and others.

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013

Lab on a Chip
New biochip technology uses tiny whirlpools to corral microbes
Researchers have demonstrated a new technology that combines a laser and electric fields to create tiny centrifuge-like whirlpools to separate particles and microbes by size, a potential lab-on-a-chip system for medicine and research.

NIH/National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013
New American Chemical Society video series: Conversations with Celebrated Scientists
The American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society, today launched a new video series that will feature noted scientists discussing the status of knowledge in their fields, their own research, and its impacts and potential impacts on society. Chemistry over Coffee: Conversations with Celebrated Scientists is available at www.acs.org/ChemistryOverCoffee.

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013

Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics
Rice University discovers that graphene oxide soaks up radioactive waste
Graphene oxide has a remarkable ability to quickly remove radioactive material from contaminated water, researchers at Rice University and Lomonosov Moscow State University have found.

US Office of Naval Research, M-I SWACO, US Air Force

Public Release: 8-Jan-2013

Physical Review Letters
DNA prefers to dive head first into nanopores
A new study from Brown University researchers finds that DNA strands have a natural tendency to be pulled through nanopores headfirst. The research answers some fundamental questions about how DNA interacts with nanopores, which soon may enable lightning fast DNA analysis.

Intel Corporation, National Science Foundation

Public Release: 7-Jan-2013

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Penn researchers show new level of control over liquid crystals
An interdisciplinary team of researchers from the University of Pennsylvania has shown a new way to direct the assembly of liquid crystals, generating small features that spontaneously arrange in arrays based on much larger templates.

National Science Foundation, Penn Materials Research Science and Engineering Center

Public Release: 6-Jan-2013

Nature Materials
Living cells behave like fluid-filled sponges
Animal cells behave like fluid-filled sponges in response to being mechanically deformed according to new research published today in Nature Materials.

Public Release: 6-Jan-2013

Metrologia
How the kilogram has put on weight
Using a state-of-the-art Theta-probe XPS machine experts at Newcastle University, UK, have shown the original kilogram is likely to be tens of micrograms heavier than it was when the first standard was set in 1875. And they say a suntan could be the key to helping it lose weight.

Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

Public Release: 3-Jan-2013
Turning smartphones into secure and versatile keys
It's already possible to open doors using an app -- but we are a long way from seeing widespread acceptance of this in the market. Now, researchers have developed a piece of software that will make the technology even more secure and versatile.

Public Release: 3-Jan-2013

Advanced Materials
Nanoparticles reach new peaks
Rice researchers have found a way to selectively heat diverse nanoparticles in a batch that could advance their medical and industrial use.

National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 3-Jan-2013

Science
Rethinking bacterial persistence
EPFL scientists used microfluidics to observe the behavior of individual tuberculosis-like bacteria in the presence of antibiotics. Their observations call into question the prevailing theory of bacterial resistance, and they have proposed a new explanation for why some bacteria become resistant. The research is published January 4, 2013 in the journal Science.

Public Release: 26-Dec-2012
New funding to research 'super material' graphene
Imperial scientists will receive £4.5 million public funds to investigate how "super material" graphene can drive improvements in high-tech industry.

Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, BIS, UK Treasury

Public Release: 24-Dec-2012

Nature
Liquid crystal research, future applications advance
Contributing geometric and topological analyses of micro-materials, University of Massachusetts Amherst mathematician Robert Kusner aided experimental physicists at the University of Colorado by successfully explaining the observed "beautiful and complex patterns revealed" in three-dimensional liquid crystal experiments. The work is expected to lead to creation of new materials that can be actively controlled.

Public Release: 20-Dec-2012

Chemical Communications
Aldrich Materials Science discovers liquid-free preparation of metal organic frameworks
Researchers from Aldrich Materials Science have discovered an innovative approach to fully excluding liquids from the preparation of MOFs. The liquid-free method means fewer potential contaminants, making the resulting MOFs ideal for applications requiring high purity, such as sensors and detectors or electronic and magnetic materials.

Public Release: 20-Dec-2012

Lab on a Chip
A nanoscale window to the biological world
Investigators at the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute have invented a way to directly image biological structures at their most fundamental level and in their natural habitats. The technique is an advancement toward imaging biological processes in action at the atomic level.

Public Release: 20-Dec-2012

Physical Review Letters
The paths of photons are random -- but coordinated
Researchers at the Niels Bohr Institute have demonstrated that photons (light particles) emitted from light sources embedded in a complex and disordered structure are able to mutually coordinate their paths through the medium. This is a consequence of the photons' wave properties, which give rise to the interaction between different possible routes.

Public Release: 20-Dec-2012

Angwandte Chemie
2 problems in chemical catalysis solved
The research group of Professor Petri Pihko at the Department of Chemistry and the NanoScience Center of the University of Jyväskylä has solved two acute problems in chemical catalysis.

University of Jyvaskyla Department of Chemistry, NanoScience Center

Public Release: 20-Dec-2012
Changing our material future, layer by layer
Researchers are aiming to develop a new class of materials with remarkable properties using one atom-thick substances such as graphene in a new collaborative project.

Public Release: 19-Dec-2012
National Academy of Inventors names four UT Arlington professors as charter fellows
Four University of Texas at Arlington engineering professors have been named charter fellows to the National Academy of Inventors.

Public Release: 19-Dec-2012
UT Arlington engineers working to prevent heat buildup within 3D integrated circuits
In the effort to pile more power atop silicon chips, engineers have developed the equivalent of mini-skyscrapers in three-dimensional integrated circuits and encountered a new challenge: how to manage the heat created within the tiny devices.

National Science Foundation

Public Release: 19-Dec-2012

Nature Nanotechnology
Synthetic and biological nanoparticles combined to produce new metamaterials
Scientists from Aalto University, Finland, have succeeded in organizing virus particles, protein cages and nanoparticles into crystalline materials. These nanomaterials are important for applications in sensing, optics, electronics and drug delivery.

Public Release: 18-Dec-2012

Physical Review B
Penn metamaterials experts show a way to reduce electrons' effective mass to nearly 0
The field of metamaterials involves augmenting materials with specially designed patterns, enabling those materials to manipulate electromagnetic waves and fields in previously impossible ways. Now, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania have come up with a theory for moving this phenomenon onto the quantum scale, laying out blueprints for materials where electrons have nearly zero effective mass. Such materials could make for faster circuits with novel properties.

US Air Force Office of Scientific Research


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