While our planet's average annual temperature has increased at a steady pace in recent decades, there has been an alarming jump in the severity of the hottest days of the year during that same period, with the most lethal ...
Environment
Jan 24, 2018
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362
Scientists sometimes think of a planet's atmosphere as an engine. Potential energy, supplied by heat from a parent star, is converted into kinetic energy, producing winds that swirl around the planet and drive storms.
Space Exploration
Oct 30, 2017
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9
Traditionally, heat engines produce heat from the exchange between high-temperature and low-temperature baths. Now, imagine a heat engine that operates at quantum scale, and a system made up of an atom interacting with light ...
Quantum Physics
Oct 11, 2017
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0
Advanced plastics could usher in lighter, cheaper, more energy-efficient product components, including those used in vehicles, LEDs and computers—if only they were better at dissipating heat.
Polymers
Aug 2, 2017
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284
Research from The University of Manchester has thrown new light on the use of miniaturised 'heat engines' that could one day help power nanoscale machines like quantum computers.
Quantum Physics
May 15, 2017
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45
Designers of future moon missions and bases have to contend with a chilling challenge: how might their creations endure the fortnight-long lunar night? ESA has arrived at a low-cost way of surviving.
Space Exploration
Mar 24, 2017
1
24
Cities. They sprawl and tangle, juxtaposing ancient public squares and glistening skyscrapers. They provide homes for half of humanity, and economic and cultural centers for the rest.
Hi Tech & Innovation
Mar 14, 2017
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5
(Phys.org)—A few years ago, physicists showed that it's possible to erase information without using any energy, in contrast to the assumption at the time that erasing information must require energy. Instead, the scientists ...
Researchers know that more, and more dangerous, storms have begun to occur as the climate warms. A team of scientists has reported an underlying explanation, using meteorological satellite data gathered over a 35-year period.
Earth Sciences
Jan 24, 2017
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1386
(Phys.org)—Illustrating the unusual way things work on the nanoscale, scientists have designed a new nanoelectromechanical system (NEMS) that produces mechanical motion due to the interactions between electrons—yet unlike ...
