Power/Performance Bits: Jan. 16


Lithium-iron-oxide battery Scientists at Northwestern University and Argonne National Laboratory developed a rechargeable lithium-iron-oxide battery that can cycle more lithium ions than its common lithium-cobalt-oxide counterpart, leading to a much higher capacity. For their battery, the team not only replaced cobalt with iron, but forced oxygen to participate in the reaction process as we... » read more

The Week in Review: IoT


Products/Services Vancouver, B.C.-based Riot Micro has brought out the RM1000 baseband modem chip for the cellular Internet of Things. The device is said to use Bluetooth Low Energy and Wi-Fi techniques to provide low-power and lower-cost connectivity, like short-range wireless systems. The chip is being marketed to module manufacturers and OEMs developing narrowband IoT and LTE-M products for... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: June 13


Theoretical all-carbon circuits Engineers at the University of Texas at Dallas, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Central Florida, and Northwestern University designed a novel computing system made solely from carbon. "The concept brings together an assortment of existing nanoscale technologies and combines them in a new way," said Dr. Joseph S. Friedman, ass... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: April 18


3D printing on Mars Northwestern University has demonstrated the ability to print 3D-based structures using compounds that resemble Martian and lunar dust. The idea is that if humans begin to colonize the moon and Mars, they may require 3D printers. With 3D printers, humans can make small tools, buildings and other objects. For this, researchers from Northwestern have developed novel in... » read more

System Bits: Jan. 3


Clues to high-temp superconductivity Offering clues about the microscopic origins of high-temperature superconductivity, physicists at Rice University’s Center for Quantum Materials (RCQM) have created a new iron-based material. The material is a formulation of iron, sodium, copper and arsenic created by Rice graduate student Yu Song in the laboratory of physicist Pengcheng Dai. The recip... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: July 12


Thin transistors Scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory developed a way to chemically assemble transistors and circuits that are only a few atoms thick. The team controlled the synthesis of a transistor in which narrow channels were etched onto conducting graphene, with molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) seeded in the blank channels. Both of these m... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: Sept. 15


Stretchy metal Washington State University researchers stretched metal films used in flexible electronics to twice their size without breaking. The discovery could lead to dramatic improvements and addresses one of the biggest challenges in flexible electronics, an industry still in its infancy with applications such as bendable batteries, robotic skins, wearable monitoring devices and se... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Oct. 29


Diamond chips The optical transistor, which transports photons, holds great promise. Photons are not only faster than electrons, but they have less crosstalk. But optical transistors are also expensive and difficult to produce. In a possible breakthrough, the ICFO-Institute of Photonic Sciences has demonstrated a “nano-size” diamond that can act as an efficient optical switch. Researche... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: July 23


Space Tubes In 2011, NASA produced a material that absorbs on average more than 99% of the ultraviolet, visible, infrared, and far-infrared light that hits it. NASA’s so-called “super-black” material is based on a thin layer of multi-walled carbon nanotubes. Tiny gaps between the nanotubes collect and trap light. The carbon absorbs the photons, preventing them from reflecting off surf... » read more

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