Nanotechnology Spotlight – Latest Articles

Showing Spotlights 1697 - 1704 of 3579 in category All (newest first):

Bioinspired mechanochromic devices (w/videos)

Jellyfish can change from a transparent state to an opaque state when disturbed. Tactile stimulation can instantaneously evoke the contraction of radial muscles in the margin of a nectosac, resulting in a crumpled morphology with inward folds. Due to the wrinkles/folding that form, light will be scattered instead of travelling directly through the skin, resulting in a more opaque appearance. Inspired by marine life, a variety of these mechanochromic devices are created by researchers. These devices are able to undergo change from transparency to opaqueness, as well as a changes in color and pattern upon simply stretching and releasing the substrate.

September 2, 2016

Zwitterionic nanoparticle coatings to bypass the protein corona problem

Very recently, the use of zwitterionic coatings has emerged as an alternative strategy to provide corona free nanoparticles. The layers of proteins adsorbed to the surface of a nanomaterial at any given time is known as the protein corona. This protein layer can hinder interactions between the targeting ligands at the surface of nanoparticles and their binding partners on the cells' surface. Researchers found that by using both zwitterionic- and targeting-ligands at the surface of nanoparticles, the shielding effects of protein corona can be reduced.

September 1, 2016

Nanotechnology: The future is tiny

Written by Nanowerk's Michael Berger, this just published book is a collection of essays about researchers involved in all facets of nanotechnologies. Nanoscience and nanotechnology research are truly multidisciplinary and international efforts, covering a wide range of scientific disciplines such as medicine, materials sciences, chemistry, biology and biotechnology, physics and electronics. Each of the book's chapters is based on a scientific paper that has been published in a peer-reviewed journal. Although each story revolves around one or two scientists who were interviewed for this book, many, if not most, of the scientific accomplishments covered here are the result of collaborative efforts by several scientists and research groups, often from different organizations and from different countries.

August 31, 2016

Defect-engineered graphene improves supercapacitors

Traditionally, the size of electrode materials in supercapacitors is reduced to nanometers to enable high surface area and more room for storing more amounts of energy. But the microscopic electron distribution in nanocarbons limits the total amount of stored energy through a property called 'quantum capacitance'. Although a lot of charge could be stored in the pores on nanocarbons due to their high surface area, their inherently low quantum capacitance reduces the net energy that could be drawn from supercapacitors. Researchers have controllably added nitrogen atoms to graphene to achieve carbon supercapacitors ready for practical applications.

August 25, 2016

Controlling light and heat on the nanoscale with hybrid optical-thermal antennas

Localization of photons to nanoscale volumes with the aid of plasmonic nanoantennas opened new horizons in bio(chemical) sensing and nanoscale imaging. However, plasmon resonances are short-lived, and the photon energy quickly dissipates as heat, creating temperature gradients on plasmonic chips. In new work, researchers have proposed design rules to engineer hybrid optical-thermal antennas that offer multiple functionalities in nanoscale light and heat management.

August 24, 2016

Thermoelectric paper devices utilize waste heat to power electronics and sensors (w/video)

The fact that temperature differentials (heat) are ubiquitously present in our environment makes thermoelectric energy harvesting a highly attractive research field. New work highlights the fabrication of flexible thermoelectric materials and modules by merging colloidal nanomaterials (quantum dots) that can be tuned for efficient heat-to-electricity energy conversion with naturally abundant cellulose paper that are low in cost and have inherently low thermal conductivity.

August 23, 2016

Naked-eye plasmonic colorimetry and SERS dual-mode sensor (w/video)

Point-of-care diagnostics, food safety screening, and environmental monitoring will massively benefit from the label-free, inexpensive, rapid, handheld sensor devices that are currently under development. To date, there has been a lot of work reported on either SERS or plasmonic sensing but very few have reported sensing with the same device for both SERS and plasmonics, let alone plasmonic colorimetry naked-eye sensing. For the first time ever, researchers have reported the combination of naked-eye plasmonic colorimetry and high-enhancement and high-uniformity SERS in one sensor.

August 19, 2016

2D electrode materials enable high performance sodium ion full cells

Sodium-ion batteries (SIBs) represent an attractive alternative to lithium-ion batteries, owing to the fact that sodium resources are practically inexhaustible and evenly distributed around the world while the ion insertion chemistry is largely identical to that of lithium. Researchers have now rationally designed and fabricated a sodium ion full battery where both of the cathode and anode materials possessed very unique two-dimensional nanostructured architecture. The 2D nanostructured architecture results in excellent rate capability and stable cycling performance.

August 17, 2016