Smart materials: Fused liquid marbles show their strength

'Liquid marbles' are a peculiar new substance made by rolling water droplets into powders incapable of dissolving in water. The resulting micro- and nanoscale-particles act like soft solids, and can speed along surfaces without ...

Finding the keys to boiling heat transfer

A team of MIT researchers has succeeded in carrying out the first systematic investigation of the factors that control boiling heat transfer from a surface to a liquid. This process is crucial to the efficiency of power plants ...

Scientists develop cheaper, more efficient fuel cells

(Phys.org) —Using the Canadian Light Source (CLS) synchrotron, researchers have discovered a way to create cheaper fuel cells by dividing normally expensive platinum metal into nanoparticles (or even single atoms) for use ...

Microfluidic devices move from application to fundamental science

(Phys.org) —Just a few drops of liquid or a bit more is run past specialized sensors in microfluidic devices to detect chemicals of concern to doctors and security personnel. However, these devices are now being reinvented ...

Physicists find right (and left) solution for on-chip optics

(Phys.org) —A Harvard-led team of researchers has created a new type of nanoscale device that converts an optical signal into waves that travel along a metal surface. Significantly, the device can recognize specific kinds ...

Nanosuits help small creatures survive a vacuum

(Phys.org) —Scientists use scanning electron microscopes (SEMs) to study tiny structures in small organisms. SEMs can only work in a high vacuum, and exposure to such a vacuum normally causes living things to die very ...

Superconducting qualities of topological insulators demonstrated

(Phys.org) —Topological insulators (TIs) are an exciting new type of material that on their surface carry electric current, but within their bulk, act as insulators. Since the discovery of TIs about a decade ago, their ...

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