Researchers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology, both in Pasadena, have developed a new type of amplifier for boosting electrical signals. The device can be used for everything from studying stars, galaxies and black holes to exploring the quantum world and developing quantum computers.
“This amplifier will redefine what it is possible to measure,” said Jonas Zmuidzinas, chief technologist at JPL, who is Caltech’s Merle Kingsley Professor of Physics and a member of the research team.(more…)
Berkeley Lab researchers use an ultrafast laser to better understand high-temperature superconductors
Superconductivity, in which electric current flows without resistance, promises huge energy savings – from low-voltage electric grids with no transmission losses, superefficient motors and generators, and myriad other schemes. But such everyday applications still lie in the future, because conventional superconductivity in metals can’t do the job.
Although they play important roles in science, industry, and medicine, conventional superconductors must be maintained at temperatures a few degrees above absolute zero, which is tricky and expensive. Wider uses will depend on higher-temperature superconductors that can function well above absolute zero. Yet known high-temperature (high-Tc) superconductors are complex materials whose electronic structures, despite decades of work, are still far from clear. (more…)
*UMD Researchers Discover Nanoscale Phenomena with Potential for Computer Speed Advances*
College Park, Md.– A team of University of Maryland scientists have discovered that when electric current is run through carbon nanotubes, objects nearby heat up while the nanotubes themselves stay cool, like a toaster that burns bread without getting hot. Understanding this completely unexpected new phenomenon could lead to new ways of building computer processors that can run at higher speeds without overheating.
“This is a new phenomenon we’re observing, exclusively at the nanoscale, and it is completely contrary to our intuition and knowledge of Joule heating at larger scales-for example, in things like your toaster,” says first author Kamal Baloch, who conducted the research while a graduate student at the University of Maryland. “The nanotube’s electrons are bouncing off of something, but not its atoms. Somehow, the atoms of the neighboring materials-the silicon nitride substrate-are vibrating and getting hot instead.” (more…)
ANN ARBOR, Mich.— Why is the universe magnetized? It’s a question scientists have been asking for decades. Now, an international team of researchers including a University of Michigan professor have demonstrated that it could have happened spontaneously, as the prevailing theory suggests.
The findings are published in the Jan. 26 edition of Nature. Oxford University scientists led the research. (more…)
