New LED streetlight design curbs light pollution

Streetlights illuminate the night, shining upon roadways and sidewalks across the world, but these ubiquitous elements of the urban environment are notoriously inefficient and major contributors to light pollution that washes ...

Microdrones with light-driven nanomotors

A hand-held laser pointer produces no noticeable recoil forces when it is "fired"—even though it emits a directed stream of light particles. The reason for this is its very large mass compared to the very small recoil impulses ...

A new method for exploring the nano-world

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light (MPL) and Max-Planck-Zentrum für Physik und Medizin (MPZPM) in Erlangen present a large step forward in the characterization of nanoparticles. They used a special ...

Researchers develop new variant of Maxwell's demon at nanoscale

Maxwell's demon is a machine proposed by James Clerk Maxwell in 1867. The hypothetical machine would use thermal fluctuations to obtain energy, apparently violating the second principle of thermodynamics. Now, researchers ...

Photosynthesis starts with a single photon, study shows

Using a complex cast of metal-studded pigments, proteins, enzymes, and co-enzymes, photosynthetic organisms can convert the energy in light into the chemical energy for life. And now, thanks to a study published June 14 in ...

Geometry of intricately fabricated glass makes light trap itself

Laser light traveling through ornately microfabricated glass has been shown to interact with itself to form self-sustaining wave patterns called solitons. The intricate design fabricated in the glass is a type of "photonic ...

page 3 from 20