Most polymers — materials made of long, chain-like molecules — are very good insulators for both heat and electricity. But an MIT team has found a way to transform the most widely used polymer, polyethylene, into a material that conducts heat just as well as most metals, yet remains an electrical insulator.

The new process causes the polymer to conduct heat very efficiently in just one direction, unlike metals, which conduct equally well in all directions. This may make the new material especially useful for applications where it is important to draw heat away from an object, such as a computer processor chip. The work is described in a paper published on March 7 in Nature Materials. Continue Reading »

A team of scientists at MIT have discovered a previously unknown phenomenon that can cause powerful waves of energy to shoot through minuscule wires known as carbon nanotubes. The discovery could lead to a new way of producing electricity, the researchers say.

The phenomenon, described as thermopower waves, “opens up a new area of energy research, which is rare,” says Michael Strano, MIT’s Charles and Hilda Roddey Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering, who was the senior author of a paper describing the new findings that appeared in Nature Materials on March 7. The lead author was Wonjoon Choi, a doctoral student in mechanical engineering. Continue Reading »

A team of engineers from the University of Seville (US) has created a system for monitoring historical monuments by remote control and detecting possible damage. Five years ago the researchers placed various sensors on the Giraldillo, the sculpture that crowns the Giralda, and now they are publishing the results in the journal Structural Health Monitoring. Continue Reading »

Of the things users expect their cell phones to be — address book, calendar, camera, music player — a wallet isn’t one of them, according to research by a Kansas State University marketing professor.

Cell phone users are leery of putting banking accounts, identification and other sensitive information onto a device that gets left in cars, buried in the bottoms of purses and lost between sofa cushions, said Esther Swilley, a K-State assistant professor of marketing. Continue Reading »

Physicists have taken major step forward in the development of practical phonon lasers, which emit sound in much the same way that optical lasers emit light. The development should lead to new, high-resolution imaging devices and medical applications. Just as optical lasers have been incorporated into countless, ubiquitous devices, a phonon laser is likely to be critical to a host of as yet unimaginable applications. Continue Reading »

For nearly half a century, scientists have been trying to figure out how to build a cost-effective and reasonably sized X-ray laser that could, among other things, provide super high-resolution imaging. And for the past two decades, University of Colorado at Boulder physics professors Margaret Murnane and Henry Kapteyn have been inching closer to that goal. Continue Reading »

With a few simple improvements to the biogas plants, the figure can rise to 120 per cent — i.e. biogas becomes more than climate neutral. This can be compared with the standard figures used today, which indicate that biogas produces 80 per cent lower emissions than gasoline.

A research group at the Lund University has calculated the figures on behalf of the Swedish Energy Agency after having analysed a biogas plant in Skåne. The case study will make it easier to study and optimise other biogas facilities. In Sweden there are some 20 similar plants, producing biogas for use in cars and other vehicles. As much vehicle gas is produced by sewage treatment works that produce biogas from sewage sludge. Continue Reading »

Think of it as the end of cars’ slacker days: No more sitting idle for hours in parking lots or garages racking up payments, but instead earning their keep by helping store power for the electricity grid.

“Cars sit most of the time,” said Jeff Stein, a mechanical engineering professor at the University of Michigan. “What if it could work for you while it sits there? If you could use a car for something more than just getting to work or going on a family vacation, it would be a whole different way to think about a vehicle, and a whole different way to think about the power grid, too.” Continue Reading »

Even the biggest Star Trek fan would probably have trouble understanding the technical details of the research done by Queen’s University Particle Astrophysics Professor Wolfgang Rau of Kingston, Canada.

Professor Rau is the only Canadian researcher among the group of 60 scientists involved in the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search experiment (CDMS) whose latest findings are published in the latest edition of Science. Professor Rau says the project is among the top two or three most important experiments on this subject in the world. Continue Reading »

When Earth was young, it exhaled the atmosphere. During a period of intense volcanic activity, lava carried light elements from the planet’s molten interior and released them into the sky. However, some light elements got trapped inside the planet. In this week’s issue of Nature, a Rice University-based team of scientists is offering a new answer to a longstanding mystery: What caused Earth to hold its last breath? Continue Reading »