Monday, December 19, 2011

PhysOrg Newsletter Week 50

Dear Reader ,

Here is your customized PHYSorg.com Newsletter for week 50:

Trillion-frame-per-second video
By using optical equipment in a totally unexpected way, MIT researchers have created an imaging system that makes light look slow.

Closest Type Ia supernova in decades solves a cosmic mystery
Type Ia supernovae (SN Ia's) are the extraordinarily bright and remarkably similar "standard candles" astronomers use to measure cosmic growth, a technique that in 1998 led to the discovery of dark energy – and 13 years later to a Nobel Prize, "for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the universe." The light from thousands of SN Ia's has been studied, but until now their physics – how they detonate and what the star systems that produce them actually look like before they explode – has been educated guesswork.

Scientists report first solar cell producing more electrons in photocurrent than solar photons entering cell
(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have reported the first solar cell that produces a photocurrent that has an external quantum efficiency greater than 100 percent when photoexcited with photons from the high energy region of the solar spectrum. 

Here come the quantum dot TVs and wallpaper
(PhysOrg.com) -- A British firm's quantum dot technology will be used for flat screen TVs and flexible screens, according to the company’s chief executive.

String theory researchers simulate big-bang on supercomputer
(PhysOrg.com) -- A trio of Japanese physicists have applied a reformulation of string theory, called IIB, whereby matrices are used to describe the properties of the physical universe, on a supercomputer, to effectively show that the universe spontaneously ballooned in three directions, leaving the other six dimensions tightly wrapped, as string theory has predicted all along. Their work, as described in a paper pre-published on the arXiv server and soon to appear in Physical Review Letters, in effect, describes the birth of the universe.

'Shrilk': Inspired by insect cuticle, researchers develop low-cost material with exceptional strength and toughness
(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University have developed a new material that replicates the exceptional strength, toughness, and versatility of one of nature's more extraordinary substances—insect cuticle. Also low-cost, biodegradable, and biocompatible, the new material, called "Shrilk," could one day replace plastics in consumer products and be used safely in a variety of medical applications.

Discovery of a 'dark state' could increase maximum theoretical efficiency of solar cells from 31 to 44 percent
The efficiency of conventional solar cells could be significantly increased, according to new research on the mechanisms of solar energy conversion led by chemist Xiaoyang Zhu at The University of Texas at Austin.

Comet defies death, brushes up to sun and lives
A small comet survived what astronomers figured would be a sure death when it danced uncomfortably close to the broiling sun Thursday night.

Internet pioneers oppose US online piracy bills
The founders of Craigslist, eBay, Google, Twitter, Yahoo! and other Internet giants expressed concern to the US Congress on Wednesday over legislation intended to crack down on online piracy.

Possible signs of the Higgs remain in latest analyses (Update)
(PhysOrg.com) -- Two experiments at the Large Hadron Collider have nearly eliminated the space in which the Higgs boson could dwell, scientists announced in a seminar held at CERN today. However, the ATLAS and CMS experiments see modest excesses in their data that could soon uncover the famous missing piece of the physics puzzle.

Optical fiber innovation could make future optical computers a 'SNAP'
Optics and photonics may one day revolutionize computer technology with the promise of light-speed calculations. Storing light as memory, however, requires devices known as microresonators, an emerging technology that cannot yet meet the demands of computing. The solution, described in a paper published today in the Optical Society's (OSA) journal Optics Letters, may lie in combining light's eerie quantum properties with a previously unknown quality of optical fiber.

RQ-170 drone's ambush facts spilled by Iranian engineer
(PhysOrg.com) -- In the aftermath of the Iran capture of a US military drone earlier this month now come arguments over how Iran managed to pull it off. An Iranian engineer’s exclusive interview with The Christian Science Monitor has been published, which details how the Iranians captured the drone through jamming. An opposing camp says the story is just that, a story, while others schooled in GPS systems say that the Iranians' technique is technically possible but they would not bet on it.

How supermassive black holes came into existence shortly after the Big Bang
(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University's Bruce and Astrid McWilliams Center for Cosmology have discovered what caused the rapid growth of early supermassive black holes — a steady diet of cold, fast food.

In third-degree burn treatment, hydrogel helps grow new, scar-free skin
Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a jelly-like material and wound treatment method that, in early experiments on skin damaged by severe burns, appeared to regenerate healthy, scar-free tissue.

Chemists propose explanation for superconductivity at high temperatures
(PhysOrg.com) -- It has been 25 years since scientists discovered the first high-temperature superconductors—copper oxides, or cuprates, that conduct electricity without a shred of resistance at temperatures much higher than other superconducting metals. Yet no one has managed to explain why these cuprates are able to superconduct at all. Now, two Caltech chemists have developed a hypothesis to explain the strange behavior of these materials, while also pointing the way to a method for making even higher-temperature superconductors.

Alzheimer's drug candidate may be first to prevent disease progression
A new drug candidate may be the first capable of halting the devastating mental decline of Alzheimer's disease, based on the findings of a study published today in PLoS One.

Cotton fabric cleans itself when exposed to ordinary sunlight
Imagine jeans, sweats or socks that clean and de-odorize themselves when hung on a clothesline in the sun or draped on a balcony railing. Scientists are reporting development of a new cotton fabric that does clean itself of stains and bacteria when exposed to ordinary sunlight. Their report appears in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

All it takes is a smile (for some guys)
Does she or doesn't she...? Sexual cues are ambiguous, and confounding. We—especially men—often read them wrong. A new study hypothesizes that the men who get it wrong might be the ones that evolution has favored. "There are tons of studies showing that men think women are interested when they're not," says Williams College psychologist Carin Perilloux, who conducted the research with Judith A. Easton and David M. Buss of University of Texas at Austin. "Ours is the first to systematically examine individual differences." The findings will appear in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal published by the Association for Psychological Science.

Scientists find microbes in lava tube living in conditions like those on Mars
(PhysOrg.com) -- A team of scientists from Oregon has collected microbes from ice within a lava tube in the Cascade Mountains and found that they thrive in cold, Mars-like conditions.

NASA Planning for Possible Landings on Europa
All these worlds are yours except Europa, Attempt no landing there, Use them together use them in peace


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