Credit: Molecule images by Stefan Jester, University of Bonn. Pasta images courtesy Wikimedia Commons.
Images of molecules for light-emitting diodes on the left are compared with similar shaped pasta on the right. The upper left electron microscope image shows spaghetti-shaped organic polymers now used for organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs. The lower left image shows new molecules – created by scientists at the University of Utah and two German universities – that are shaped like wagon-wheel or rotelle pasta and emit light more efficiently than the spaghetti-shape polymers.