Experiments Measure Freezing Point of Extraterrestrial Oceans to Aid Search for Life
A planetary scientist worked with engineers to measure the physical limits of a liquid for salty water under high pressure. Results suggest where robotic missions should look for life on the ice-covered oceans of Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Titan.
Particle Accelerators May Get a Boost from Oxygen
Scientists have developed a new theoretical model for preparing particle accelerator structures made of niobium metal. The model predicts how oxygen in the thin oxide layer on the surface of the niobium metal moves deeper into the metal during heat treatment. Tests indicate that the treatment should improve accelerator structure performance and make accelerators easier to build.
Machine Learning Program for Games Inspires Development of Groundbreaking Scientific Tool
Scientists have developed a groundbreaking AI-based algorithm for modeling the properties of materials at the atomic and molecular scale. It should greatly speed up materials discovery.
Face Shape Influences Mask Fit, Suggests Problems with Double Masking Against COVID-19
In Physics of Fluids, researchers use principal component analysis along with fluid dynamics simulation models to show the crucial importance of proper fit for all types of masks and how face shape influences the most ideal fit. They modeled a moderate cough jet from a mouth of an adult male wearing a cloth mask over the nose and mouth with elastic bands wrapped around the ears and calculated the maximum volume flow rates through the front of mask and peripheral gaps at different material porosity levels.
Facility for Rare Isotope Beams opens its doors to discovery
Michigan State University's Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB), a user facility for the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, opened its doors to discovery with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on 2 May. U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm and MSU President Samuel L. Stanley Jr., M.D., cut the ribbon to officially mark the start of FRIB's scientific mission.
Story tips: Fueling up on savings, COVID's behavior effect, cosmic collisions, seismic and sound, and space-to-ground comms
ORNL story tips: Fueling up on savings, COVID's behavior effect, cosmic collisions, seismic and sound, and space-to-ground comms
The Source of the Aurora Borealis: Electrons Surfing on Alfven Waves
New experiments have shown the source of the aurora borealis. Researchers have demonstrated Alfven waves accelerating electrons under conditions that correspond to Earth's magnetosphere. The new experiments show that electrons "surf" on the electric field of the Alfven wave in a plasma. These electrons are the ultimate source of the light we call the aurora borealis.
Light-Infused Particles Go the Distance in Organic Semiconductors
Polaritons offer the best of two very different worlds. These hybrid particles combine light and molecules of organic material, making them ideal vessels for energy transfer in organic semiconductors. They are both compatible with modern electronics but also move speedily, thanks to their photonic origins.
Fermilab Engineers Develop New Control Electronics for Quantum Computers That Improve Performance, Cut Costs
Quantum computing experiments now have a new control and readout electronics option that will significantly improve performance while replacing cumbersome and expensive systems. Developed by a team of engineers at Fermilab in collaboration with the University of Chicago, the Quantum Instrumentation Control Kit, or QICK for short, is easily scalable.
First International Conference on Heterostructured Materials (HSM I)
HSMs represent an emerging class of materials that are expected to become a major field of scientific exploration for the materials, mechanics, physics and computer simulation communities in the coming years. As an emerging materials field, many fundamental issues need to be probed.
From seawater to drinking water, with the push of a button
MIT researchers have developed a portable desalination unit, weighing less than 10 kilograms, that can remove particles and salts to generate drinking water.
Four Professors Elected to Membership in the American Academy of Arts & Sciences
Irvine, Calif., April 28, 2022 -- A quartet of professors at the University of California, Irvine, has been elected as members by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. The 242nd class of AAAS inductees includes 261 extraordinary people from around the world, recognized for their accomplishments and leadership in academia, the arts, industry, public policy and research.
Metamaterial significantly enhances the chiral nanoparticle signals
The left hand looks like the right hand in the mirror but the left-handed glove does not fit on the right hand.
Department of Energy Announces $10 Million for DOE Traineeship in Computational High Energy Physics
Today, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced $10 million in funding for traineeships in computational high energy physics. This funding will support graduate student research that trains the next generation of computational scientists and engineers needed to deliver scientific discoveries.
Researchers Design Simpler Magnets for Twisty Facilities That Could Lead to Steady-State Fusion Operation
Harnessing the power that makes the sun and stars shine could be made easier by powerful magnets with straighter shapes than have been made before. Researchers linked to the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory have found a way to create such magnets for fusion facilities known as stellarators.
Brookhaven Chemist Minfang Yeh Wins 2021 DPF Instrumentation Award
UPTON, NY--Minfang Yeh, a senior scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, has won the American Physical Society's 2021 Division of Particles and Fields (DPF) Instrumentation Award. The award honors Yeh's pioneering work in the development and production of high-performance water-based liquid scintillators for particle physics experiments, including metal loaded scintillators for rare process experiments.
Two ERC Advanced Grants for Scientists of KIT
Double success for KIT: In its 2021 awarding round, the European Research Council (ERC) has decided to award an Advanced Grant each to computer scientist Mehdi Tahoori and physicist Alexey Ustinov. For their research projects in the areas of technical informatics and quantum physics, the renowned scientists will receive funding in the amount of about 2.5 million and 2.7 million euros, respectively, over the next five years.
Fault-tolerant quantum computer memory in diamond
Quantum computing holds the potential to be a game-changing future technology in fields ranging from chemistry to cryptography to finance to pharmaceuticals.
Glimpse inside a graphene sandwich
Since the first successful fabrication of a two-dimensional structure of carbon atoms about 20 years ago, graphene has fascinated scientists.
See How Quantum 'Weirdness' Is Improving Electron Microscopes
Two new advances from the lab of University of Oregon physicist Ben McMorran are refining the microscopes. Both come from taking advantage of a fundamental principle of quantum mechanics: that an electron can behave simultaneously like a wave and a particle. It's one of many examples of weird, quantum-level quirks in which subatomic particles often behave in ways that seem to violate the laws of classical physics.
Media Invited to Acoustical Society of America Meeting in Denver, May 23-27
Echolocation, biomedicine, engineering, aquatics, and more will be showcased at the 182nd ASA Meeting in Denver, May 23-27. The in-person scientific conference brings together acoustical experts and researchers from around the world to talk about sound experiments and applications in fields as diverse as space exploration, sports, marine biology, cancer therapies, speech perceptions, and many other areas. Reporters are invited to attend the meeting at no cost and participate in a series of press conferences featuring a selection of newsworthy sessions.
Researchers use muonic x-rays to find elemental makeup of samples without damaging them
By combining technologies originally designed for high-energy particle accelerators and astronomy observations, researchers can now for the first time analyze the elemental makeup of samples without damaging them, which could be useful for researchers working in other fields such as archaeology, reports a new study in Scientific Reports.
Complex Networks Help Explain Extreme Rainfall Events
In Chaos, researchers propose using a complex-network-based clustering workflow to search for synchronized structures of extreme rainfall events within the context of atmospheric chaos. By doing this, they were able to reconstruct a functional climate network to encode the underlying interaction of the climate system. Clusters on the network revealed regions of similar climatological behaviors. This means extreme rainfalls within different locations are not independent of each other but have a certain degree of similarity.
Swelling Colloids Could Fix Short Circuits in Geothermal Wells
Swelling colloids - mixtures, such as milk and paint, in which particles are suspended in a substance and which can grow up to 100 times larger under certain temperatures - could be used to fix flow pathways in underground geothermal systems, a problem that has hobbled investment in geothermal energy.
Different Particles Get Different Treatment Inside Nuclei
For nearly four decades, scientists have known that protons and neutrons cozily bundled up inside an atom's nucleus are different from those roaming free in the cold emptiness of space. Now, for the first time, nuclear physicists at the Department of Energy's Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility have shown that while both particles are altered by their residence inside a nucleus, they may be affected differently.