Physical Sciences
The field of metamaterials is all about making structures that have physical properties that aren’t found in nature. Predicting what kinds of structures would have those traits is one challenge; physically fabricating them is quite another, as they often require precise arrangement of constituent materials on the smallest scales.
When NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, on Thursday, March 12, it delivered a four-spacecraft experiment into Earth orbit that will study an important phenomenon called magnetic reconnection. Aboard each of those spacecraft is an Energetic Ion Spectrometer (EIS) instrument, designed and built by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland.
A new simple tool developed by nanoengineers at the University of California, San Diego, is opening the door to an era when anyone will be able to build sensors, anywhere, including physicians in the clinic, patients in their home and soldiers in the field. The team from the University of California, San Diego, developed high-tech bio-inks that react with several chemicals, including glucose. They filled off-the-shelf ballpoint pens with the inks and were able to draw sensors to measure glucose directly on the skin and sensors to measure pollution on leaves.
University of British Columbia researchers have found a new way to make state-of-the-art materials for energy storage using a cheap lamp from the hardware store
A new twist on an old tool lets scientists use light to study and control matter with 1,000 times better resolution and precision than previously possible.
Zebrafish ‘became chubby’ and had higher BMI upon being exposed to compounds.
University of Idaho researchers will soon have a new tool for understanding the world at the molecular level, thanks to a grant from the MJ Murdock Charitable Trust and a major gift from a private donor.
This ACS video explains the science behind astronomical aromas and celestial body odors
Ocean researchers like to say we know less about the Earth’s seas than the moon. With less than 5 percent of the world’s oceans explored, big discoveries await. To find them, University of Rhode Island students are learning to build the next generation of autonomous underwater vehicles, or AUVs, used to map seafloors, study ocean movement, locate sunken objects, research sea life and more.
Karyn M. Usher is an analytical chemist in the Department of Natural Sciences at Metropolitan State University in Saint Paul, MN. At Metro State, her research has focused on sample preparation for the determination of analytes in complex matrices by high performance liquid chromatography.
Trapping carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from power plants and various industries could play a significant role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the future. But current materials that can collect CO2—from smokestacks, for example—have low capacities or require very high temperatures to work.
