nanotubes

In the effort to find a replacement for today's silicon chips, IBM researchers have pushed carbon nanotube technology a significant step ahead.

Carbon nanotubes are very small structures made of a lattice of carbon atoms rolled into a cylindrical shape, and a team of eight researchers have figured out a way to precisely place them on a computer chip, IBM announced today. That development allows them to arrange the nanotubes 100 times more densely than earlier methods, a key step in economical chipmaking, and IBM has built a chip with more than 10,000 carbon nanotube-based elements.

The new … Read more

Year in, year out, Intel executive Mike Mayberry hears the same doomsday prediction: Moore's Law is going to run out of steam. Sometimes he even hears it from his own co-workers.

But Moore's Law, named after Intel co-founder Gordon Moore, who 47 years ago predicted a steady, two-year cadence of chip improvements, keeps defying the pessimists because a brigade of materials scientists like Mayberry continue to find ways of stretching today's silicon transistor technology even as they dig into alternatives. (Such as, for instance, super-thin sheets of carbon graphene.)

Oh, and don't forget the money that'… Read more

Gather 'round kiddies, and I'll tell you a story about pointy wooden things called pencils. Before the explosion of keyboards and touch screens, people used to use them to do something called writing. On paper.

Now, one MIT chemistry postdoctoral student may have given the old-fashioned pencil a new lease -- though not as something you'd bring to the SAT.

Katherine Mirica and colleagues created a novel type of pencil lead, replacing graphite with a highly compressed powder made of commercially available carbon nanotubes. The resulting newfangled lead can inscribe sensors on any paper surface.

So what's the point?… Read more

When it comes to cancer cells, a particularly confounding breed called cancer stem cells have proven difficult to kill. Because they divide so slowly, chemo drugs do them little harm, and they appear resistant to heat therapies that are generally good at killing most cells. Some cancer drugs even appear to promote the growth of cancer stem cells.

Now, three years after they found that the heat from 30-second laser blasts can kill kidney cancer stem cells, researchers at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center say the same treatment works to kill breast cancer stem cells as well.

Torti's team … Read more

Is there a paint color called "crack in the bridge?"

There could be one day, if Scottish researchers continue to make progress on a low-cost smart paint that could detect microscopic faults in structures such as bridges, wind turbines, and mines.

The paint, under development at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, is made of highly aligned carbon nanotubes, which can carry an electrical current, and a recycled waste product known as fly ash that's usually produced during coal combustion.

When mixed, the paint takes on a cement-like property that makes it hardy and particularly useful in areas where the weather can make regular safety monitoring difficult.

"There are no limitations as to where it could be used, and the low-cost nature gives it a significant advantage over the current options available in the industry," Mohamed Saafi, chair of the university's department of civil engineering, said in a statement. "The process of producing and applying the paint also gives it an advantage, as no expertise is required and monitoring itself is straightforward." … Read more

IBM researchers say they've made progress in showing how carbon nanotubes could some day replace silicon in the guts of microprocessors.

In a research paper published this month in Nano Letters, IBM researchers found that carbon nanotube transistors smaller than 10 nanometers outperformed silicon devices. These transistors also operate at very low voltage, which means they promise processors that operate with low power consumption.

The experiments researchers performed were designed to test the theoretic performance of carbon nanotube transistors, rather than develop new manufacturing processes. But the finding could be significant in the ongoing pursuit of smaller transistors for … Read more

New tests of carbon nanotubes--those tiny cylinders expected to revolutionize medicine, electronics, warfare, and more--reveal that, ounce-for-ounce, they are 117 times stronger than steel and 30 times stronger than Kevlar used in bicycle tires and bulletproof vests.

The nanotubes, roughly 50,000 of which add up to the width of an average strand of human hair, are already known for their strength. But this latest research, led by Stephen Cronin, electrical engineering assistant professor at the University of Southern California, tested individual carbon nanotubes of various lengths and widths by applying what is being rather unscientifically described as "… Read more

What's more annoying? Batteries or people who sneeze without covering their mouths? Batteries or Jay Leno?

I choose batteries. They always give out at the least opportune moments and I'm always stunned by how much they cost at the local supermarket, or, indeed, the local Apple store.

So I have not been able to resist hitching up my pants with joy on hearing that some very clever engineers at Stanford are working to make your T-shirt, your pants, or, indeed, your favorite purple undies become, well, Energizers.

I am indebted to the fine minds at Engadget who tossed the news my way that Yi Cui of Stanford's Department of Engineering is leading a team that may revolutionize your intimate relationship with your iPhone, BlackBerry, or any other highly personal gadget.

Professor Cui and his team have already turned paper into power with the ingenious (to me, at least) use of ink infused with carbon nanotubes. (I have embedded some evidence.)

Now, they have taken the same principle and applied it to your wardrobe.… Read more

The FCC is coming for the schools and churches just like that crazy guy on the corner told you! On June 12, it'll require anybody using a wireless microphone that operators in the 700 MHZ spectrum to stop using that mic. That's right. The purge is coming! For microphones!. Actually, it'll affect Broadway shows, too. Will the FCC be able to round up the ne'er-do-wells? Will Google ruin U.S.-China relations? Well, that's another story. Literally.