Manufacturing Bits: Nov. 18


Street light EV charging stations Looking for a place to re-charge an electric car on the road? BMW has developed one possible solution, at least in Europe. The automotive giant has demonstrated a street lighting system that doubles as a charging station for electric vehicles. Part of a pilot project called Light and Charge, the first two prototype systems have moved into operation at BMW W... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: June 3


Stabilizing common semiconductors for solar fuels generation Researchers around the world are trying to develop solar-driven generators that can split water, yielding hydrogen gas that could be used as clean fuel. These devices would require efficient light-absorbing materials that attract and hold sunlight to drive the chemical reactions involved in water splitting. As semiconductors like sil... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: April 29


Silky e-beam lithography Tufts University has put a soft and silky spin on direct-write electron-beam lithography. Researchers used common silk as the resist material, enabling the production of photonic lattices, quantum dots and other structures. This approach is a green alternative to traditional and toxic resists. The silk-based resist is developed using a water-based process. It starts... » read more

Grappling With Graphene


By Brian Fuller Silicon CMOS is a tough act to follow. The workhorse building block for the world’s electronics has been delivering for system designers for a half century. Despite hand-wringing over its apparent scalability limits, it shows only vague signs of slowing down. For nearly as many years, it seems, the next great material or alternative to silicon CMOS has popped into the indu... » read more