Research Bits: Jan. 30


Etching tellurite glass Physicists from EPFL and Tokyo Tech propose a way to create photoconductive circuits, where the circuit is directly patterned onto a tellurite glass surface with femtosecond laser light. The exposure formed nanoscale tellurium and tellurium oxide crystals, both semiconducting materials. “Tellurium being semiconducting, based on this finding we wondered if it would ... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: Feb. 27


Encryption chip A team at MIT developed a new chip to lower the power consumption of public-key cryptography for IoT devices. Software execution of encryption protocols require more energy and memory space than embedded IoT sensors can typically spare, given the need to maximize battery life. The new chip is hardwired to perform public-key encryption and consumes only 1/400 as much power as... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: Feb. 20


Wireless TENG Researchers at Clemson University developed a wireless triboelectric nanogenerator, or W-TENG, that can also act as a battery-free remote. The key to triboelectric nanogenerators is using materials that are opposite in their affinity for electrons so they generate a voltage when brought in contact with each other. For the W-TENG, one electrode was constructed of a multipart... » read more