Technologies & Strategies That Enable R&D
New technique advances carbon-fiber composites
May 20, 2013 7:31 am | by Jennifer Chu, MIT News Office | News | CommentsThese days, aerospace engineering is all about the light stuff. Advanced carbon-fiber composites have been used in recent years to lighten planes’ loads. For the next generation of commercial jets, researchers are looking to even stronger and lighter materials, such as composites made with carbon fibers coated with carbon nanotubes. However, a significant hurdle to achieving such composites has existed, until now.
Local CROs Unite for International Clinical Trials
May 20, 2013 3:41 am | by The Associated Press | News | CommentsGlobal CROs are no longer the obvious choice for companies looking to run international clinical trials. The motion is towards locally based CROs that are connected internationally to drive down R&D costs and leverage local know-how and quality.
Topography of Eastern Seaboard muddles ancient sea level changes
May 17, 2013 12:31 pm | by Ann Stark, LLNL | News | CommentsAccording to research taking place at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the distortion of the ancient shoreline and flooding surface of the U.S. Atlantic Coastal Plain are the direct result of fluctuations in topography in the region and could have implications on understanding long-term climate change, according to a new study.
Record-breaking high-energy particles detected by telescope buried in Antarctic
May 17, 2013 12:26 pm | News | CommentsA massive telescope buried in the Antarctic ice has detected 28 extremely high-energy neutrinos—elementary particles that likely originate outside our solar system. Two of these neutrinos had energies many thousands of times higher than the highest-energy neutrino that any man-made particle accelerator has ever produced, according to a team of IceCube Neutrino Observatory researchers. The estimate is greater than 1 peta-electron volt.
Physicists create world’s smallest drops
May 17, 2013 12:15 pm | News | CommentsResults of a recent experiment conducted at the Large Hadron Collider may have generated the smallest drops of liquid ever produced in a laboratory. Evidence of the minuscule droplets was extracted from the results of colliding protons with lead ions at velocities approaching the speed of light. According to the scientists’ calculations, these short-lived droplets are the size of three to five protons.
Study: Earth's iron core is surprisingly weak
May 17, 2013 10:54 am | News | CommentsThe massive ball of iron sitting at the center of Earth is not quite as "rock-solid" as has been thought, say two Stanford University mineral physicists. By conducting experiments that simulate the immense pressures deep in the planet's interior, the researchers determined that iron in Earth's inner core is only about 40% as strong as previous studies estimated.
Research improves dry lubricant used in machinery, biomedical devices
May 17, 2013 10:44 am | News | CommentsNearly everyone is familiar with the polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), otherwise known as Teflon. Famous for being “non-sticky” and water repellent, PTFE is a dry lubricant used on machine components everywhere. Recently, engineering researchers at the University of Arkansas found a way to make the polymer even less adhesive.
Tiny camera in Illinois offers bug's eye view
May 17, 2013 9:47 am | News | CommentsA tiny new camera developed at an Illinois university is giving researchers a bug's eye view. The camera created by a research team at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is about the size of a penny and mimics insects' bulging eyes. It features 180 micro-lenses, giving it a panoramic field of view and the ability to focus simultaneously on objects at different depths.
Motorized XY Microscope Stage
May 17, 2013 9:15 am | Product Releases | CommentsZaber Technologies has introduced a new motorized xy microscope stage designed to replace manual stages on upright and inverted microscopes. The ASR microscope stage can be used with many common microscopes such as Leica, Nikon, Olympus, and Zeiss, or for standalone operation as scanning stages.
Lasers for Life Science Applications
May 17, 2013 9:12 am | Product Releases | CommentsA new series of Sapphire lasers from Coherent Inc. at 594 nm are suitable for fluorescence-based applications in life sciences. Based on Coherent’s optically pumped semiconductor laser (OPSL) technology, these Sapphire 594 lasers offer high performance, reliability, and efficiency.
Nanocrystals grow from liquid interface
May 17, 2013 8:48 am | News | CommentsAn international collaboration of scientists has discovered a unique crystalizing behavior at the interface between two immiscible liquids that could aid in sustainable energy development. Liquid interface behavior cannot be investigated at atomic level by most modern methods. Only brilliant X-rays at world-leading light sources can investigate this type of important chemical processes.
New pump resolves big space station leak
May 17, 2013 8:20 am | by Marcia Dunn, AP Aerospace Writer | News | CommentsAn impromptu spacewalk over the weekend seems to have fixed a big ammonia leak at the International Space Station, NASA said Thursday. The "gusher" erupted a week ago, prompting the hastiest repair job ever by residents of the orbiting lab. Spacewalking astronauts replaced a suspect ammonia pump on Saturday, just two days after the trouble arose.
Stacking 2D materials produces surprising results
May 17, 2013 7:46 am | by David L. Chandler, MIT News Office | News | CommentsGraphene has dazzled scientists ever since its discovery more than a decade ago. But one long-sought goal has proved elusive: how to engineer into graphene a property called a band gap, which would be necessary to use the material to make transistors and other electronic devices. New findings by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers are a major step toward making graphene with this coveted property.
New study: Fracking hasn't polluted Arkansas water
May 16, 2013 5:58 pm | by KEVIN BEGOS - Associated Press - Associated Press | News | CommentsHydraulic fracturing for natural gas hasn't contaminated drinking water wells in Arkansas, according to a new study, but researchers said the geology there may be more of a natural barrier to pollution than in other areas where shale gas drilling takes place.
Private spaceship tests underway
May 16, 2013 3:17 pm | by BROCK VERGAKIS - Associated Press - Associated Press | News | CommentsA Colorado company developing a spaceship to take astronauts to the International Space Station is having elements of its spacecraft undergo landing-related tests at NASA facilities in Virginia and California. NASA wants private firms to ferry astronauts into low-Earth orbit so it can focus on deep-space exploration and send crews to a nearby asteroid and eventually Mars.
