Feature Channels: Materials Science

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An entirely human-made architecture produces hydrogen fuel using light, shows promise for transmitting energy in numerous applications.

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Novel defect control in graphene enables direct imaging of trapped electrons that follow Einstein’s rules.

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Metal-organic frameworks with chains of iron centers adsorb and release carbon monoxide with very little energy input.

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Smartphones and computers wouldn’t be nearly as useful without room for lots of apps, music and videos. Devices tend to store that information in two ways: through electric fields (think of a flash drive) or through magnetic fields (like a computer’s spinning hard disk). Each method has advantages and disadvantages. However, in the future, our electronics could benefit from the best of each.

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In quantum materials, periodic stripe patterns can be formed by electrons coupled with lattice distortions. To capture the extremely fast dynamics of how such atomic-scale stripes melt and form, Berkeley Lab scientists used femtosecond-scale laser pulses at terahertz frequencies. Along the way, they found some unexpected behavior.

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Transistors based on carbon nanostructures: what sounds like a futuristic dream could be reality in just a few years' time. An international research team working with Empa has now succeeded in producing nanotransistors from graphene ribbons that are only a few atoms wide, as reported in the current issue of the trade journal "Nature Communications."

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Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory have developed germanium nanoparticles with improved photoluminescence, making them potentially better materials for solar cells and imaging probes. The research team found that by adding tin to the nanoparticle’s germanium core, its lattice structure better matched the lattice structure of the cadmium-sulfide coating which allows the particles to absorb more light.

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A team of Department of Energy (DOE) scientists at the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research (JCESR) has discovered the fastest magnesium-ion solid-state conductor, a major step towards making solid-state magnesium-ion batteries that are both energy dense and safe.

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In experiments with the lab’s ultrafast ‘electron camera,’ laser light hitting a material is almost completely converted into nuclear vibrations, which are key to switching a material’s properties on and off for future electronics and other applications.

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One drop of liquid, a cutting-edge laser 3D-printer and a few hours are all it takes to make a fidget spinner smaller than the width of a human hair. The tiny whirligig was created by researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences to illustrate the facility’s unique resources and expertise available to scientists across the world. The microscale fidget spinner measures only 100 microns wide, or one tenth of a millimeter, but the capabilities it represents are enormous.

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Windows that generate electricity may have a clearer path to prominent roles in buildings of the future due to an Argonne-led discovery.

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Anatoly Frenkel, Morgan May, Rachid Nouicer, Eric Stach, and Peter Steinberg were recognized for their outstanding contributions to astrophysics, materials physics, and nuclear physics.

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Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have received nine R&D 100 Awards in recognition of their significant advancements in science and technology.

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Innovative technologies developed by researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory recently earned several R&D 100 Awards.

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The discovery of nanoscale changes deep inside hybrid perovskites could shed light on developing low-cost, high-efficiency solar cells. Using X-ray beams and lasers, a team of researchers led by the University of California San Diego discovered how the movement of ions in hybrid perovskites causes certain regions within the material to become better solar cells than other parts.

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Stony Brook assistant professor Jason Trelewicz uses the electron microscopy and computing resources at Brookhaven Lab's Center for Functional Nanomaterials to characterize nanoscale structures in metals mixed with other elements. The goal of his research is to achieve unprecedented properties in classical materials for use in everything from aerospace and automotive components to consumer electronics and nuclear reactors.

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An international team from the Universities of Vienna, Duisburg-Essen and Tel Aviv have created a nanomechanical hand to show the time of an electronic clock, by spinning a tiny cylinder using light. A silicon nanorod, less than a thousandth of a millimetre long, can be trapped in thin air using focussed laser beams, and spun to follow the ticking of a clock, losing only one-millionth of a second over four days.

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In a breakthrough development, Los Alamos scientists have shown that they can successfully amplify light using electrically excited films of the chemically synthesized semiconductor nanocrystals known as quantum dots.

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A distinguished professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has been named one of world’s most cited academic researchers in the field of engineering by Clarivate Analytics, a leading company that monitors scholarly data.

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The dangerous wobbling of pedestrian bridges could be reduced by using biomechanically inspired models of pedestrian response to bridge motion and a mathematical formula to estimate the critical crowd size at which bridge wobbling begins, according to a study led by Georgia State University.

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A team of researchers from Penn State and Princeton University have taken a big step toward creating a diode laser from a hybrid organic-inorganic material that can be deposited from solution on a laboratory benchtop.

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Germanium was the material of choice in the early history of electronic devices, and due to its high charge carrier mobility, it’s making a comeback. It’s generally grown on expensive single-crystal substrates, adding another challenge to making it sustainably viable for most applications. To address this aspect, researchers demonstrate an epitaxy method that incorporates van der Waals’ forces to grow germanium on mica. They discuss their work in the Journal of Applied Physics.

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Studies at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have made the first real-time observations of how silica – an abundant material in the Earth’s crust – easily transforms into a dense glass when hit with a massive shock wave like one generated from a meteor impact.

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Research offers cost-effective development of germanium, more efficient semiconductor than silicon

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Scientists use heat and mismatched surfaces to stretch films that can potentially improve the efficient operation of devices.

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Defect spins in diamond were controlled with a simpler, geometric method, leading to faster computing.

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The unparalleled liquid strength of cartilage, which is about 80 percent water, withstands some of the toughest forces on our bodies

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Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis and ORNL are using neutrons to study what happens when cyanobacteria cell samples are starved for nitrogen. They are especially interested in how this process affects phycobilisomes, large antenna protein complexes in the cells that harvest light for photosynthesis.

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By binding photosensitive dyes to common plastic membranes and adding water, chemists at the University of California, Irvine have made a new type of solar power generator. The device is similar to familiar silicon photovoltaic cells but differs in a fundamental way: Instead of being produced via electrons, its electricity comes from the motion of ions.

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A new study has revealed a chain mail-like woven microstructure that gives parrotfish teeth their remarkable ability to chomp on coral all day long – the structure could serve as a blueprint for designing ultra-durable synthetic materials.

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In the future, new designer alloys for aerospace applications can be manufactured using the 3-D laser melting process (Additive Manufacturing). Pioneering work in this field was provided by Empa researcher Christoph Kenel, who works today at Northwestern University (Chicago). Empa grants him the Research Award 2017.

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In motors, generators and similar electric machines, the electrical current that powers them generates magnetic fields that magnetize some of the metallic components. Choosing the right magnetic material is crucial for designing efficient machines, so researchers in Germany analyzed the existing system for characterizing soft magnetic materials, which are easily magnetized. To identify a better system for quality control, they looked at several factors that can affect the uncertainty inherent in the measurement of magnetic properties. Their results are in this week’s AIP Advances.

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Readily rotating molecules let electrons last, resulting in higher solar cell efficiency.

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Livermore researchers conducted the first Livermore-designed “criticality” experiment in 40 years. It was one in a series that aims to help ensure plutonium operations – which are key to assessing the U.S. nuclear stockpile without testing – continue to be conducted safely.

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An international researcher team used neutron analysis at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, x-ray crystallography and other techniques to study chlorite dismutase, an enzyme that breaks down the environmental pollutant chlorite into harmless byproducts. The results shed light on the catalytic process and open possibilities for bioremediation.

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When hit by a powerful shock wave, materials can change their shape – a property known as plasticity – yet keep their lattice-like atomic structure. Now scientists have used the X-ray laser at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory to see, for the first time, how a material’s atomic structure deforms when shocked by pressures nearly as extreme as the ones at the center of the Earth.

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The U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science announced 55 projects with high potential for accelerating discovery through its Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment (INCITE) program. The projects will share 5.95 billion core-hours on three of America’s most powerful supercomputers dedicated to capability-limited open science and support a broad range of large-scale research campaigns from infectious disease treatment to next-generation materials development.

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To find the right balance of moisture and temperature in a specialized type of hydrogen fuel cell, Berkeley Lab scientists have used X-rays to explore the inner workings of its components at tiny scales.

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Harnessing the power of the sun can help meet the increasing demand for energy worldwide—and the solar cell research group at South Dakota State University is doing its part to make this possible.

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A transfer technique based on thin sacrificial layers of boron nitride could allow high-performance gallium nitride gas sensors to be grown on sapphire substrates and then transferred to metallic or flexible polymer support materials. The technique could facilitate the production of low-cost wearable, mobile and disposable sensing devices for a wide range of environmental applications.

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Regulators claim that the value of the energy savings to consumers exceeds the incremental costs to manufacturers for delivering greater energy efficiency. This energy paradox challenges fundamental notions of how markets work. Four studies presented at the 2017 Society for Risk Analysis (SRA) Annual Meeting will present new evidence relating to this paradox.

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Rural counties continue to rank lowest among counties across the U.S., in terms of health outcomes. A group of national organizations including the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the National 4-H Council are leading the way to close the rural health gap.

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Argonne researchers are partnering with Idaho National Laboratory and National Renewable Energy Laboratory to identify and fill gaps hindering the commercialization of extreme fast charging — for electric vehicles that can be charged in minutes instead of hours.

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Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and their collaborators discovered that a workhorse catalyst of vehicle exhaust systems—an “oxygen sponge” that can soak up oxygen from air and store it for later use in oxidation reactions—may also be a “hydrogen sponge.”

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There’s been an unsolved mystery associated with mixed valence compounds: When the valence state of an element in these compounds changes with increased temperature, the number of electrons associated with that element decreases, as well. But just where do those electrons go? Using a combination of state-of-the-art tools, including X-ray measurements at the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS), a group of researchers at Cornell University have come up with the answer.

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Argonne researchers have simulated the growth of the 2-D material silicene. Their work, published in Nanoscale, delivers new and useful insights on the material’s properties and behavior and offers a predictive model for other researchers studying 2-D materials.

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Metamaterials have amazing potential—think invisibility cloaks and perfect lenses—but they are more likely to be found in a Harry Potter novel than a lab. To help bring them closer to reality, researchers delved into the complex fundamental physics of metamaterials.

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Judith A. Todd, P.B. Breneman department head chair and professor of engineering science and mechanics, has been elected to the Board of Trustees of ASM International.

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The arrangement of electrons in an exotic human-made element shows that certain properties of heavy elements cannot be predicted using lighter ones.

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Modifying the internal structure of 2-D hybrid perovskite materials causes them to emit white light.