http://phys.org/nanotech-news/nano-physics/ en-us Phys.org Phys.Org provides the latest news on nanophysics, nanotechnology, nanotech and nanoscience. (Phys.org) —Graphene has dazzled scientists, ever since its discovery more than a decade ago, with its unequalled electronic properties, its strength and its light weight. But one long-sought goal has proved elusive: how to engineer into graphene a property called a band gap, which would be necessary to use the material to make transistors and other electronic devices. http://phys.org/news287943744.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-16T17:22:40-07:00 (Phys.org) —In the wake of the sobering news that atmospheric carbon dioxide is now at its highest level in at least three million years, an important advance in the race to develop carbon-neutral renewable energy sources has been achieved. Scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have reported the first fully integrated nanosystem for artificial photosynthesis. While "artificial leaf" is the popular term for such a system, the key to this success was an "artificial forest." http://phys.org/news287931960.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-16T14:06:07-07:00 Nanotechnology draws on the fabrication of nanostructures. Scientists have now succeeded in growing a unique carbon structure at the nanoscale that resembles a tiny twirled mustache. Their method might lead the way to the formation of more complex nano-networks. Researchers of the Electronic Properties of Materials Group at the Faculty of Physics (University of Vienna) and their international collaborators have published their results in the new open-access journal of the Nature Publishing group, Scientific Reports. http://phys.org/news287920350.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-16T10:52:44-07:00 A team of researchers from Columbia University, City University of New York, the University of Central Florida (UCF), and Tohoku University and the National Institute for Materials Science in Japan, have directly observed a rare quantum effect that produces a repeating butterfly-shaped energy spectrum, confirming the longstanding prediction of this quantum fractal energy structure, called Hofstadter's butterfly. The study, which focused on moiré-patterned graphene, is published in the May 15, 2013, Advance Online Publication (AOP) of Nature. http://phys.org/news287824835.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-15T13:00:09-07:00 Whether in vehicle transmissions, hip replacements, or tiny sensors for triggering airbags: The respective components must slide against each other with minimum friction to prevent loss of energy and material wear. Investigating the friction behavior of nanosystems, scientists from the Technische Universitaet Muenchen have discovered a previously unknown type of friction that sheds new light on some previously unexplainable phenomena. http://phys.org/news287834755.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-15T11:06:19-07:00 Nanotubes are stronger than steel and smaller than any element of silicon-based electronics. They can potentially process information faster while using less energy. The challenge has been figuring out how to incorporate these properties into useful electronic devices. Now scientists at the University of California, Riverside have discovered that by adding ionic liquid—a kind of liquid salt—they can modify the optical transparency of single-walled carbon nanotube films in a controlled pattern. http://phys.org/news287769987.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-14T17:06:37-07:00 One of the most promising new kinds of battery to power electric cars is called a lithium-air battery, which could store up to four times as much energy per pound as today's best lithium-ion batteries. But progress has been slow: The nature of the electrochemical reactions as these batteries are charged remains poorly understood. http://phys.org/news287650555.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-13T08:30:03-07:00 (Phys.org) —The foundation of many modern electronic devices, such as computer chips, are thin films – nanoscale-thickness layers of one material grown on the surface of another. As consumers continue to demand products that are sleeker and faster, understanding the evolution of thin-film growth will help scientists learn to tailor thin films for new technologies. http://phys.org/news287650425.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-13T07:53:57-07:00 (Phys.org) —The mention of a two-dimensional material with excellent electrical and optical properties may first bring to mind graphene. However, this description also fits another class of materials called transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs). Although TMDs in bulk form have been studied for decades—before graphene was even discovered—only recently they have been isolated to monolayers. With recent advances in nanomaterial characterization, scientists have recognized the potential of monolayer TMDs in applications such as LEDs, optical energy conversion, and other 2D optoelectronics technologies. http://phys.org/news287245266.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-08T15:40:01-07:00 The latest research from a Kansas State University chemical engineer may help improve humidity and pressure sensors, particularly those used in outer space. http://phys.org/news287237867.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-08T13:18:00-07:00 Seeing the fine-scale properties of materials relevant to nanotechnology is a prominent challenge that currently can be met only under ideal conditions. Coherent X-ray imaging promises to greatly expand the range of materials and environments in which these important properties can be observed. Users from Argonne's Materials Science and Nanoscience & Technology divisions, in collaboration with the X-Ray Microscopy Group at the Center for Nanoscale Materials and researchers from the Advanced Photon Source, KAIST, Northern Illinois University, and the University of Melbourne, have reported the development of a new X-ray imaging technique, coherent X-ray Bragg projection ptychography, and its application to the study of nanoscale structures in ferroelectric thin films. http://phys.org/news287135825.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-07T09:20:01-07:00 A team led by Professor Keon Jae Lee from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at KAIST has developed in vivo silicon-based flexible large scale integrated circuits (LSI) for bio-medical wireless communication. http://phys.org/news287056262.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-06T10:51:23-07:00 (Phys.org) —Columbia Engineering researchers have developed a technique to isolate a single water molecule inside a buckyball, or C60, and to drive motion of the so-called "big" nonpolar ball through the encapsulated "small" polar H2O molecule, a controlling transport mechanism in a nanochannel under an external electric field. They expect this method will lead to an array of new applications, including effective ways to control drug delivery and to assemble C60-based functional 3D structures at the nanoscale level, as well as expanding our understanding of single molecule properties. The study was published as a "Physics Focus" in the April 12 issue of Physical Review Letters. http://phys.org/news287051485.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-06T09:31:34-07:00 (Phys.org) —Two French researchers, Guilhem Larrieu and Xiang‑Lei Han, may have succeeded in possibly setting back the date to which Moore's Law would no longer apply by creating a new kind of nanowire Field-Effect Transistor (FET). In their paper published in the journal Nanoscale, the two describe how they built a "gate-all-around" made of 225 nanowires, each with its own 14nm-thick chromium layer that serves as a gate. http://phys.org/news286703508.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-02T09:30:01-07:00 (Phys.org) —Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have discovered that a nanocrystal moving through a nanotube due to an electric charge is able to pass through a portion of the nanotube that is smaller in diameter than the crystal, without melting or undergoing compression. In their paper published in the journal Physical Review Letters, the team describes how they observed an iron nanocrystal move through a narrow channel in a nanotube without its properties being changed in the process. http://phys.org/news286702910.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-02T08:42:16-07:00 (Phys.org) —Scientists from IBM today unveiled the world's smallest movie, made with one of the tiniest elements in the universe: atoms. Named "A Boy and His Atom," the Guinness World Records -verified movie used thousands of precisely placed atoms to create nearly 250 frames of stop-motion action. http://phys.org/news286605486.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-05-01T05:38:19-07:00 A new transistor capable of revolutionizing technologies for medical imaging and security screening has been developed by graphene researchers from the Universities of Manchester and Nottingham. http://phys.org/news286536427.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-30T11:00:06-07:00 (Phys.org) —Researchers have married two biological imaging technologies, creating a new way to learn how good cells go bad. http://phys.org/news286120907.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-25T15:01:54-07:00 Using bundles of vertical zinc oxide nanowires, researchers have fabricated arrays of piezotronic transistors capable of converting mechanical motion directly into electronic controlling signals. The arrays could help give robots a more adaptive sense of touch, provide better security in handwritten signatures and offer new ways for humans to interact with electronic devices. http://phys.org/news286115788.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-25T14:00:13-07:00 (Phys.org) —The macroscopic effects of certain nanoparticles on human health have long been clear to the naked eye. What scientists have lacked is the ability to see the detailed movements of individual particles that give rise to those effects. http://phys.org/news286095232.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-25T08:10:01-07:00 (Phys.org) —Resistive memory cells (ReRAM) are regarded as a promising solution for future generations of computer memories. They will dramatically reduce the energy consumption of modern IT systems while significantly increasing their performance. Unlike the building blocks of conventional hard disk drives and memories, these novel memory cells are not purely passive components but must be regarded as tiny batteries. This has been demonstrated by researchers of Jülich Aachen Research Alliance (JARA), whose findings have now been published in the prestigious journal Nature Communications. The new finding radically revises the current theory and opens up possibilities for further applications. The research group has already filed a patent application for their first idea on how to improve data readout with the aid of battery voltage. http://phys.org/news286011469.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-24T08:38:09-07:00 There's big news in the world of tiny things. New research led by University of Cincinnati physics professors Howard Jackson and Leigh Smith could contribute to better ways of harnessing solar energy, more effective air quality sensors or even stronger security measures against biological weapons such as anthrax. And it all starts with something that's 1,000 times thinner than the typical human hair – a semiconductor nanowire. http://phys.org/news285939905.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-23T12:45:13-07:00 (Phys.org) —When a team of University of Illinois engineers set out to grow nanowires of a compound semiconductor on top of a sheet of graphene, they did not expect to discover a new paradigm of epitaxy. http://phys.org/news285918576.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-23T06:49:47-07:00 (Phys.org) —Recent progress in the engineering of plasmonic structures has enabled new kinds of nanometer-scale optoelectronic devices as well as high-resolution optical sensing. But until now, there has been a lack of tools for measuring nanometer-scale behavior in plasmonic structures which are needed to understand device performance and to confirm theoretical models. http://phys.org/news285852747.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-22T12:32:39-07:00 (Phys.org) —Researchers Baoxing Xu and Xi Chen, working at Columbia University, have created a computer simulation that shows it's possible to manipulate the movement of a 60-atom fullerene, with a water molecule trapped inside of it, using an electrical charge. They describe their simulation and results in their paper published in Physical Review Letters. http://phys.org/news285841819.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-22T09:30:29-07:00 Smart electronics are taking the world by storm. From techno-textiles to transparent electronic displays, the world of intelligent technology is growing fast and a revolutionary new device has just been added to its ranks. Researchers at the University of Exeter have developed a new photoelectric device that is both flexible and transparent. The device, described in a paper in the journal ACS Nano, converts light into electrical signals by exploiting the unique properties of the recently discovered materials graphene and graphExeter. GraphExeter is the best known room temperature transparent conductor and graphene is the thinnest conductive material. http://phys.org/news285592316.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-19T12:12:26-07:00 Researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology and Kansas State University have demonstrated a spray-on mixture of carbon nanotubes and ceramic that has unprecedented ability to resist damage while absorbing laser light. http://phys.org/news285438819.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-17T17:33:52-07:00 (Phys.org) —Devices that harvest energy from the environment require specific environmental conditions; for instance, solar cells and piezoelectric generators require sunlight and mechanical vibration, respectively. Since these conditions don't exist all the time, most energy harvesters don't generate a constant stream of electricity. In order to harvest ubiquitous energy continuously, researchers have designed and fabricated a hybrid energy harvester that integrates a solar cell and piezoelectric generator, enabling it to harvest energy from both sunlight and sound vibration simultaneously. http://phys.org/news285412932.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-17T11:00:01-07:00 (Phys.org) —Though they be but little, they are fierce. The most powerful batteries on the planet are only a few millimeters in size, yet they pack such a punch that a driver could use a cellphone powered by these batteries to jump-start a dead car battery – and then recharge the phone in the blink of an eye. http://phys.org/news285346627.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-16T15:57:47-07:00 (Phys.org) —Scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory and other labs have demonstrated a process whereby quantum dots can self-assemble at optimal locations in nanowires, a breakthrough that could improve solar cells, quantum computing, and lighting devices. http://phys.org/news285342855.html Nanotechnology - Nanophysics 2013-04-16T14:54:22-07:00