Showing Spotlights 17 - 24 of 2116 in category (newest first):
Over the past few decades, researchers have developed various optical voltage sensing probes in order to overcome the highly invasive nature of electrode-based techniques. These voltage sensing mechanisms can be hampered by some combination of limitations including low sensitivity, slow kinetics, or heavy capacitive loading. This has motivated a group of researchers to explore DNA nanotechnology for developing novel optical voltage sensing nanodevices that convert a local change of electric potential into optical signals.They now report that a voltage can be read out in a nanopore with a dedicated Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) sensor on a DNA origami.
Posted: Mar 26th, 2018
Researchers have used a few-layer antimonene nanosheet to demonstrate all optical modulation in optical signal processing. To utilize the saturable absorption property of few-layer antimonene, antimonene-decorated microfiber was employed as an optical saturable absorber that can allow for passive mode-locking, Q-switching and all-optical thresholding at the telecommunication band. These results may provide guidance for the application of antimonene and other Group VA mono-elemental 2D materials in ultra-short pulse generation and all optical thresholding with enhanced long term stability.
Posted: Mar 23rd, 2018
Imagine you are fast asleep in your bedroom when a fire breaks out somewhere else in your house. Fortunately, you have nanotechnology-enhanced wallpaper that detects the fire and automatically rings an alarm. Realizing this idea, scientists have developed a 'smart' wallpaper based on highly flexible fire-resistant inorganic paper embedded with ultralong hydroxyapatite nanowires that serve as the substrate and graphene oxide as the thermosensitive sensor.
Posted: Mar 21st, 2018
Imagine being able to print out healthy tissue with just a sample of a patient's own cells. While printed replacement human body parts might seem like science fiction, the use of 3D printing technologies for medical applications is a relatively new but rapidly expanding research field, although still quite a way from clinical application for treating patients. However, currently available bioinks cannot 3D print self-sustaining anatomic-size structures containing live cells. To overcome the limitations of existing bioinks, researchers have developed a highly printable bioink for fabricating large scale, cell-laden, bioactive scaffolds.
Posted: Mar 20th, 2018
Researchers report a simple method to facilitate the mass production of flexible photonic crystals (FPCs) with full-color grating properties. The nanoimprinted FPC structure is capable of displaying full-color grating properties because of the nano-hemispherical structures on its surface. This novel approach requires relatively inexpensive equipment and much less time than previous techniques. In addition, multiple anti counterfeiting applications can be easily implemented based on the polymer's intrinsic characteristics.
Posted: Mar 19th, 2018
Despite the rise of graphene and other two-dimensional (2-D) materials, semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes are still regarded as strong candidates for the next generation of high-performance, ultra-scaled and thin-film transistors as well as for opto-electronic devices. In new work, a European team of researchers demonstrates simultaneous confinement of electrons and holes between artificial defects separated by less than 10 nm in semiconducting carbon nanotubes.
Posted: Mar 16th, 2018
Scientists have discovered that cell sex is an important overlooked factor at the nanobio interfaces. More specifically, depending on their sex, cells respond differently to the exact same type of nanoparticles. These findings have a capacity to optimize clinical translation of nanoparticles and also to help researchers to better design and produce safe and efficient therapeutic sex-specific nanoparticles. It is likely that there are other undiscovered differences that could influence nanoparticle uptake.
Posted: Mar 15th, 2018
Single- or few-layer black phosphorus (BP) is one of the most promising two-dimensional semiconductors for electronic and optoelectronic device applications but its environmental instability has always posed a major hurdle for BP-based devices. In contrast, black phosphorus analogues (BPA) nanoarchitectures not only own the similar folded structure of BP, its tunable bandgap energy band and high carrier mobility, but exhibit excellent environmental stability as well. BPA nanosheets can be fabricated by a facile liquid-phase exfoliation method.
Posted: Mar 14th, 2018
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