Group items tagged

Related to our Airport security discussion

A joint Harvard-MIT research program led by Harvard Professor of Physics Mikhail Lukin and MIT Professor of Physics Vladan Vuletic has created a new state of matter the two describe as extremely similar to the lightsabers seen in "Star Wars."

"Photonic molecules"? Intriguing..

I am also looking into this idea since some time and it seems NASA is already ahead, awarding two contract to investigate magnetoshell aerocapture. This could be interesting for probes that want to enter eg Marsian atmospheres at relatively high velocity. Or for multiple re-entry s/c at Earth. The idea of the experiment, The satellite will carry a copper coil, powered by a lithium-ion battery, that generates a magnetic field around the probe. As it descends, the spacecraft will eject a small amount of plasma. This gets trapped in the magnetic field, creating a protective bubble that stops air molecules colliding with the craft and producing heat.

A few years back Mimmo has worked on this, rather from the theory side if I remember well ...

The power requirements for such a thing must be HUGE!

Jul 13, Nanotechnology/Nanomaterials Researchers have shown that clusters of 40 boron atoms form a molecular cage similar to the carbon buckyball. This is the first experimental evidence that such a boron cage structure exists. Credit: Wang lab / Brown UniversityThe discovery 30 years ago of soccer-ball-shaped carbon molecules called buckyballs helped to spur an explosion of nanotechnology research.

"A new lightweight, energy-efficient tool for analyzing a material's chemical makeup could improve the detection abilities of various technologies, ranging from bomb-detecting drones to space rovers searching for signs of life". Raman Spectroscopy is about measuring vibrational modes in molecules. This vibrational modes are in the meV typically, turning Raman Spectroscopy into a high precision technique. This impressive work shows a new technique based on the use of optical fibers coupled to photomultipliers allowing its use, author's word, in extreme conditions such as unmanned aircraft vehicles (UAVs) and Mars/Moon rovers.

Sounds like a metastable one. Wondering which half-life period it has, this is the primary issue concerning its technical applicability...

Researchers at IBM have made a significant breakthrough in their quest to combine DNA strands with conventional lithographic techniques to create tiny circuit boards.

The new battery, which is described in the journal Nature, is based on an organic molecule-called a quinone-that's found in plants such as rhubarb and can be cheaply synthesized from crude oil.

Two apps - the Distributed Electronic Cosmic-ray Observatory (DECO) and Cosmic Rays Found in Smartphones (CRAYFIS) - transform smartphones into miniature cosmic-ray detectors. They use the CMOS chips inside phones' onboard cameras to detect the secondary particles produced when cosmic rays - energetic, charged subatomic particles arriving from beyond the solar system - collide with air molecules in the Earth's atmosphere

"Hormones are molecules that act as the body's signals, triggering various physiological responses. The newly discovered hormone, dubbed "MOTS-c," primarily targets muscle tissue, where it restores insulin sensitivity, counteracting diet-induced and age-dependent insulin resistance." Good news for long distance space travelers?

as well as lazy couch potatoes

Bio-inspired assembly of fluorescent molecules boosts the fluorescence output.

Nice read! It is actually part of the Ariadna PETE study of one of the teams. You can supervise if you want :)

Research in active-matter systems is a growing field in biology. It consists in using theoretical statistical physics in living systems such as molecule colonies to deduce macroscopic properties. The aim and hope is to understand how cells divide, take shape and move on these systems. Being a crossing field between physics and biology "The pot of gold is at the interface but you have to push both fields to their limits." one can read

Maybe we should discuss about this active matter one of these days? "These are the hallmarks of systems that physicists call active matter, which have become a major subject of research in the past few years. Examples abound in the natural world - among them the leaderless but coherent flocking of birds and the flowing, structure-forming cytoskeletons of cells. They are increasingly being made in the laboratory: investigators have synthesized active matter using both biological building blocks such as microtubules, and synthetic components including micrometre-scale, light-sensitive plastic 'swimmers' that form structures when someone turns on a lamp. Production of peer-reviewed papers with 'active matter' in the title or abstract has increased from less than 10 per year a decade ago to almost 70 last year, and several international workshops have been held on the topic in the past year."