and other vertebrate animals to regulate energy metabolism. The insulin genes were expressed more highly in the venom gland than genes for some of the established venom toxins.
The snail insulin could prove useful as a tool to probe the systems the human body uses to control blood sugar and energy metabolism.
The clock signal alone synchronizing the circuits uses up to 30%of the energy--energy which can be saved through optical transmission explains Prof.
The next big step forward will be generating laser light with electricity instead and without the need for cooling if possible.
and the nanomaterials involved in energy conversion or storage. But this also means that the X-rays pass straight through conventional lenses without being bent or focussed.
where optical pulses are generated with petawatt class peak energies and picosecond pulse widths. The individual laser bars in these pump sources have a typical output power between 300 and 500 Watts.
corresponding to a pulse energy of 0. 4 J. Peak power was limited by the available current.
Such bars have the potential to play an important role in future high-energy-class laser facilities.
The final pump sources are being evaluated for potential use in high-energy-class diode-pumped solid-state laser systems together with the world-leading groups in the field
the new approach uses x-rays at energies that are lower than normal, and at different levels."
#Getting rid of pinholes in solar cells The pinholes, identified by OIST's Energy Materials and Surface Sciences Unit led by Prof.
Yabing Qi, were described in the Chemistry of Materials earlier this year. The pinholes in the top layer of the solar cell, known as the hole transport layer, were identified as a key cause for the quick degradation of perovskite solar cells.
Researchers around the world are investigating the potential of perovskite, a humanmade organic-inorganic hybrid material, as an alternative to silicon-based solar cells."
"Pinholes are a very critical problem because it's a pathway for moisture and oxygen to attack the perovskite material,
which is the active layer converting sunlight to energy, "said Min-Cherl Jung, a staff scientist at OIST and first author of this work."
"The researchers eliminated the pinholes by using a different method to create the top layer of the solar cell,
and the spiro-OMETAD molecules deposited onto the solar cell. To create this layer, a solar cell is positioned upside down on the ceiling of a vacuum chamber.
As the spiro-OMETAD is heated up, it evaporates and the gas molecules that stick to the perovskite,
"We were able to reduce the thickness of the solar cell from over 200 nanometers to 70 nanometers."
The result again was a significant improvement--they could finely tune the energy level of that layer to closely match the layer beneath it,
which makes the movement of"holes"carrying positive charges around the solar cell circuit much easier.""A very small difference between the top layer and perovskite material means maybe we get greater energy efficiency,
"Jung said. The evaporation method also resulted in a much longer-lasting solar cell. Before, the cells would lose the ability to efficiently convert sunlight into electricity after a couple of days.
Now, their efficiency remains high for more than 35 days. While cheaper than conventional silicon-based solar cells, evaporation-based perovskite solar cells are more expensive than spin-coated cells.
The team is now working to determine how to strike a balance between cost and efficiency
and hopefully find a way to use solution processing without creating pinholes s
#High-temperature superconductivity in atomically thin films A research group has succeeded in fabricating an atomically thin,
because the unique quantum effects in superconductors are a great advantage in achieving the energy saving
#Revolutionary microbe for biofuel production developed Biofuels pioneer Mascoma LLC and the Department of energy's Bioenergy Science Center have developed a revolutionary strain of yeast that could help significantly accelerate the development of biofuels from nonfood plant matter.
features fermentation and ethanol yields that set a new standard for conversion of biomass sugars from pretreated corn stover--the non-edible portion of corn crops such as the stalk--converting up to 97 percent
Researchers announced that while conventional yeast leaves more than one-third of the biomass sugars unused in the form of xylose,
and convert sugars from lignocellulosic biomass has accelerated greatly the translation of basic research outcomes to a commercial product,
"Although cellulosic biomass such as corn stover, wheat straw and bagasse (the fibrous remains after sugar is extracted from sugarcane
or heat-loving, bacteria to produce biofuels directly from biomass in a single process o
shows that a primordial form of energy production that still exists in mammals can be harnessed to achieve spontaneous tissue regeneration in mice, without the need for added stem cells.
The researchers created a scaled-down template of the athletic logo and drilled out tiny perforations on the top layer of the metamaterial structure.
#Stable perovskite solar cells developed through structural simplification Lead-halide-based perovskite (hereinafter simply referred to as perovskite) has been used as a solar cell material since six years ago.
Perovskite solar cells are promising low-cost and highly-efficient next-generation solar cells because they can be produced through low-temperature processes such as spin coating,
and generate a large amount of electricity due to their high optical absorption together with the high open-circuit voltage.
As such, the research on perovskite solar cells is making rapid progress. In order to identify the semiconducting properties of perovskites
and formulate guidelines for the development of highly efficient solar cell materials, NIMS launched an ad hoc Team on Perovskite PV Cells last October led by the deputy director-general of GREEN.
While the conventional perovskite solar cells have demonstrated high conversion efficiency, they were not sufficiently stable plagued by their low reproducibility
and the hysteresis in the current-voltage curves depending on the direction of the voltage sweeps.
Researchers successfully created reproducible and stable perovskite solar cells as follows; They proposed an equivalent circuit model that explains the semiconducting properties of perovskites based on analysis of the internal resistance of perovskite solar cells.
This model indicated the existence of a charge transport process derived from an impurity level between the conduction
Due to this transport process, the efficiency of perovskite solar cells may be suppressed to some extent. In future studies, researchers will investigate into the cause of the impurity level and its influence on solar cells.
In addition, they intend to remove the impurity level and improve the efficiency of the solar cells,
thereby contributing to energy and environmental conservation. This study was conducted at GREEN as a part of the MEXT-commissioned project titled"Development of environmental technology using nanotechnology."
"Arra a
#Psychology researchers report a major discovery of harmony amid chaos The researchers say the study demonstrates that inherent delays in the nervous system may play a constructive role in enabling individuals to anticipate the movement of others.
This process creates a current of magnetic dipoles that we use to manipulate the orientation of a second magnetic layer,
or provide electrical power.""""We use the spin current created by ultrafast heat conduction to generate spin transfer torque.
#Engineer creates origami battery, for five cents Arraythe battery generates power from microbial respiration, delivering enough energy to run a paper-based biosensor with nothing more than a drop of bacteria-containing liquid."
"Dirty water has a lot of organic matter, "Choi says.""Any type of organic material can be the source of bacteria for the bacterial metabolism."
"The method should be especially useful to anyone working in remote areas with limited resources. Indeed, because paper is inexpensive and readily available,
which a paper-based battery would create enough energy--we're talking microwatts--to run the biosensor.
Choi's battery, which folds into a square the size of a matchbook, uses an inexpensive air-breathing cathode created with nickel sprayed onto one side of ordinary office paper.
Choi, who holds two U s. patents, initially collaborated on the paper battery with Hankeun Lee,
"while working on an earlier iteration of the paper-based batteries, before he tried the origami approach."
and biological systems at the atomic level with high efficiency is a current roadblock to solving many of today's greatest scientific challenges in energy,
such as operating batteries and catalysts. It could enable the manipulation of the inner workings of matter to understand,
and the focus size was measured at beamline 34-ID-C. The research was funded by the U s. Department of energy, Office of Basic energy Sciences and the National Science Foundation n
it could be considered for other sites where uranium was processed for nuclear arsenals or power plant fuel. While the problem isn't widespread,
The current 3. 5-inch lab prototype, for example, has a force threshold level of 200 newtons--capable of absorbing the energy of a 100 mph fastball in 0. 03 seconds.
#Key to quick battery charging time University of Tokyo researchers have discovered the structure and transport properties of the"intermediate state"in lithium-ion batteries--key to understanding the mechanisms of charge
and discharge in rechargeable batteries. These findings may help accelerate battery reaction speed and significantly shorten battery charging time.
Although there is strong demand to minimize battery-charging time, the mechanisms of battery charge and discharge reactions have yet to be understood fully.
While the existence of an"intermediate state"that accelerates battery charge and discharge reactions has been suggested,
there was no firm experimental evidence to support its existence and previous research had suggested that the short lifetime of the intermediate state would render a systematic investigation of its properties impossible.
Now Professor Atsuo Yamada's research group at the University of Tokyo Graduate school of Engineering have developed a novel technique to stabilize the intermediate state.
The group found a striped pattern of layers of densely and loosely packed electrons. Lithium ions distribute themselves so as not to disturb this striped pattern.
In addition, the intermediate state showed high lithium/electron conductivity compared to the charged or discharged state.
contributing significantly to accelerating lithium-ion battery charge and discharge reactions. The findings were contrary to expectations."
We hope to develop rechargeable batteries with quick charging time by applying our findings to the design of materials
and high-energy costs and need their gills to be working as efficiently as possible, "says co-author Dr Jodie Rummer.
#First solar cell made of highly ordered molecular frameworks"We have opened the door to a new room,
suggest that the excellent properties of the solar cell result from an additional mechanism--the formation of indirect band gaps--that plays an important role in photovoltaics.
Nature uses porphyrines as universal molecules e g. in hemoglobin and chlorophyll, where these organic dyes convert light into chemical energy.
A metal-organic solar cell produced on the basis of this novel porphyrine-MOF is presented now by the researchers in the journal Angewandte Chemie (Applied Chemistry.
"The clou is that we just need a single organic molecule in the solar cell, "Wöll says.
and take up electric charges. By means of a process developed at KIT, the crystalline frameworks grow in layers on a transparent,
Thanks to their mechanical properties, MOF thin films of a few hundred nanometers in thickness can be used for flexible solar cells or for the coating of clothing material or deformable components.
While the demand for technical systems converting sunlight into electricity is increasing, organic materials represent a highly interesting alternative to silicon that has to be processed at high costs before it can be used for the photoactive layer of a solar cell l
#A diode a few atoms thick shows surprising quantum effect A quantum mechanical transport phenomenon demonstrated for the first time in synthetic,
which is supported by the U s. Department of energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic energy Sciences, under Contract No.
#New formula expected to spur advances in clean energy generation Researchers from the University of Houston have devised a new formula for calculating the maximum efficiency of thermoelectric materials, the first new formula in more than a half-century,
whether devices based on a material would generate energy efficiently enough to be worth pursuing, said Zhifeng Ren, principal investigator at the Texas Center for Superconductivity at UH (Tcsuh."
Thermoelectric materials produce electricity by exploiting the flow of heat current from a warmer area to a cooler area,
In thermoelectric materials, efficiency is calculated as the measure of how well it converts heat--often waste heat generated by power plants or other industrial processes--into power.
and produces 10 watts of electricity has an efficiency rate of 10 percent. Top efficiency for current thermoelectric materials is about 12 percent
"For this reason, it is desirable to establish a new model to predict the energy conversion efficiency based on the temperature-dependent individual TE (thermoelectric) properties for devices operating under a large temperature difference."
In an engineering first, Cui and his colleagues used lithium-ion battery technology to create one low-cost catalyst that is capable of driving the entire water-splitting reaction.'
'Our group has pioneered the idea of using lithium-ion batteries to search for catalysts, 'Cui said.'
A conventional water-splitting device consists of two electrodes submerged in a water-based electrolyte.
But in 2014, Stanford chemist Hongjie Dai developed a water splitter made of inexpensive nickel and iron that runs on an ordinary 1. 5-volt battery.
'This bifunctional catalyst can split water continuously for more than a week with a steady input of just 1. 5 volts of electricity.
'In conventional water splitters, the hydrogen and oxygen catalysts often require different electrolytes with different phone acidic,
'For practical water splitting, an expensive barrier is needed to separate the two electrolytes, adding to the cost of the device,
'But our single-catalyst water splitter operates efficiently in one electrolyte with a uniform ph.'Wang
'At first the device only needed 1. 56 volts of electricity to split water, but within 30 hours we had to increase the voltage nearly 40 percent.
the Stanford team borrowed a technique used in battery research called lithium-induced electrochemical tuning.
The technique has been used in battery research for many years, but it's a new approach for catalysis. The marriage of these two fields is very powerful.'
Novel method for controlling plasma rotation confirmed Such a method could prove important for future facilities like ITER,
the huge international tokamak under construction in France that will demonstrate the feasibility of fusion as a source of energy for generating electricity.
Rotation can stabilize instabilities in plasma, and sheared rotation--the difference in velocities between two bands of rotating plasma--can suppress plasma turbulence,
making it possible to maintain the gas's high temperature with less power and reduced operating costs.
Today's tokamaks produce rotation mainly by heating the plasma with neutral beams which cause it to spin.
however, rotating particles that leak from the edge of the plasma accelerate the plasma in the opposite direction,
Stoltzfus-Dueck and his team influenced intrinsic rotation by moving the so-called X-point--the dividing point between magnetically confined plasma
and plasma that has leaked from confinement--on the Tokamak à Configuration Variable (TCV) in Lausanne, Switzerland.
The experiments marked the first time that researchers had moved the X-point horizontally to study plasma rotation.
The results confirmed calculations that Stoltzfus-Dueck had published in a 2012 paper showing that moving the X-point would cause the confined plasma to either halt its intrinsic rotation
but modified rotation within the superhot core of the plasma where fusion reactions occur. The results indicate that scientists can use the X-point as a"control knob"to adjust the inner workings of fusion plasmas,
much like changing the settings on itunes or a stereo lets one explore the behavior of music.
"Why do plasmas rotate in the way they do? It's a puzzle. z
#Sweeping lasers snap together nanoscale geometric grids Now, scientists at the U s. Department of energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have developed a new technique to rapidly create nano-structured grids for functional materials with unprecedented versatility."
"We can fabricate multi-layer grids composed of different materials in virtually any geometric configuration,
"said study coauthor and Brookhaven Lab scientist Kevin Yager.""By quickly and independently controlling the nanoscale structure and the composition,
we can tailor the performance of these materials. Crucially, the process can be adapted easily for large-scale applications."
"Arrayfor the first step in grid construction, the team took advantage of their recent invention of laser zone annealing (LZA) to produce the extremely localized thermal spikes needed to drive ultra-fast self-assembly.
"To make these two-dimensional grids functional, the scientists converted the polymer base into other materials.
and overlap shapes the grid. We then apply the functional materials after each layer forms.
"For example, a single layer of platinum nanowires conducts electricity in only one direction, but a two-layer mesh conducts uniformly in all directions."
#New manufacturing approach slices lithium-ion battery cost in half An advanced manufacturing approach for lithium-ion batteries, developed by researchers at MIT and at a spinoff company called 24m,
promises to significantly slash the cost of the most widely used type of rechargeable batteries while also improving their performance
"says Yet-Ming Chiang, the Kyocera Professor of Ceramics at MIT and a cofounder of 24m (and previously a cofounder of battery company A123).
The existing process for manufacturing lithium-ion batteries, he says, has changed hardly in the two decades
In this so-called"flow battery,"the electrodes are suspensions of tiny particles carried by a liquid and pumped through various compartments of the battery.
The new battery design is a hybrid between flow batteries and conventional solid ones: In this version,
while the electrode material does not flow, it is composed of a similar semisolid, colloidal suspension of particles.
Chiang and Carter refer to this as a"semisolid battery.""Simpler manufacturing process This approach greatly simplifies manufacturing,
and also makes batteries that are flexible and resistant to damage, says Chiang, who is senior author of a paper in the Journal of Power Sources analyzing the tradeoffs involved in choosing between solid
and flow-type batteries, depending on their particular applications and chemical components. This analysis demonstrates that
while a flow battery system is appropriate for battery chemistries with a low energy density (those that can only store a limited amount of energy for a given weight), for high-energy density devices such as lithium-ion batteries,
Almost immediately after publishing the earlier research on the flow battery, Chiang says, "We realized that a better way to make use of this flowable electrode technology was to reinvent the lithium ion manufacturing process."
the system reduces the conventional battery architecture's number of distinct layers, as well as the amount of nonfunctional material in the structure, by 80 percent.
Bendable and foldable In addition to streamlining manufacturing enough to cut battery costs by half, Chiang says,
the new system produces a battery that is more flexible and resilient. While conventional lithium-ion batteries are composed of brittle electrodes that can crack under stress,
the new formulation produces battery cells that can be bent, folded or even penetrated by bullets without failing.
This should improve both safety and durability, he says. The company has made so far about 10
000 batteries on its prototype assembly lines, most of which are undergoing testing by three industrial partners, including an oil company in Thailand
The company is initially focusing on grid-scale installations, used to help smooth out power loads
By 2020, Chiang estimates that 24m will be able to produce batteries for less than $100 per kilowatt-hour of capacity.
when is it better to build a flow battery versus a static model. This paper will serve as a key tool for making design choices
"Viswanathan adds that 24m's new battery design"could do the same sort of disruption to lithium ion batteries manufacturing as
"Quantum dots, which have use in diverse applications such as medical imaging, lighting, display technologies, solar cells, photocatalysts, renewable energy and optoelectronics, are typically expensive and complicated to manufacture.
or chemical environment to provide unique functionality in a wide range of applications from energy to medicine.
emit light or energy, or change shape. Making IPNS has been tried before with a type of plastic known as a block copolymer,
which a microbe uses nutrients and generates energy to live and reproduce. It typically involves complex biochemical processes implemented through the orchestration of metabolic reactions and gene regulation,
reactive material system capable of performing computations without external energy inputs, amplification or computer mediation. Their research,"Achieving synchronization with active hybrid materials:
Chemical computing systems are limited by both the lack of an internal power system and the rate of diffusion as the chemical waves spread throughout the system,
which a magnetic field induces a Lorentz force on moving electric charge carriers, leading to deflection and a measurable Hall voltage.
and (2) power consumption, which varies inversely with charge carrier mobility. It is high carrier mobility that makes graphene useful in such applications,
These alterations cause impaired energy production in the cells and therefore, lead to the disease. The clinical manifestations of affected individuals are chronic progressive external ophthalmoplegia (CPEO), a slowly progressive paralysis of the extraocular muscles,
With little oxygen in the atmosphere, many organisms derived energy by metabolizing iron instead of oxygen.
"A semiconductor is a substance that conducts electricity under some conditions but not others, making it a good medium for the control of electrical current.
and power consumption of existing ultrasound sensors are currently prohibitive.""Within the realm of biometrics and information security, the group's work is particularly significant,
and entangle each photon pair into multiple dimensions using quantum properties such as the photons'energy and spin.
The idea was to take a Cooper pair--a pair of electrons that allows electricity to flow freely in superconductors
#New storage cell for solar energy storage, nighttime conversion The innovation is an advancement over the most common solar energy systems that rely on using sunlight immediately as a power source.
the ability to store solar energy and use it as a renewable alternative provides a sustainable solution to the problem of energy shortage.
It also can effectively harness the inexhaustible energy from the sun."The work is a product of the 2013 National Science Foundation $400,
and consume energy.""Dr. Liu and his colleagues are working to help us shape a more sustainable future
and use one of the larger sources of energy available to us--the sun, "Behbehani said.
said a major drawback of current solar technology is the limitation on storing energy under dark conditions."
and is powered battery so it doesn't need an outlet. Beyond thermotherapy the applications are endless.
when electromagnetic radiation emitted by an object is absorbed by the Q-Eye sensor, even down to the level of very small packets of quantum energy (a single photon).
"First, lactic acid is fed into a reactor and converted into a type of pre-plastic under high temperature and in a vacuum,
"We have applied a petrochemical concept to biomass, "says postdoctoral researcher Michiel Dusselier.""We speed up and guide the chemical process in the reactor with a zeolite as a catalyst.
Zeolites are porous minerals. By selecting a specific type on the basis of its pore shape,
FY26 is able to shut down a cancer cell by exploiting weaknesses inherent in their energy generation. The researchers argue that the drug could be cheaper to produce,
The new drug works by forcing cancer cells to use their mitochondria, the'power house'of a cell,
to generate the energy necessary to function. Whilst healthy cells use mitochondria to generate energy,
cancer cells contain defective mitochondria which are incapable of sustaining the cell's energy requirements. In the absence of FY26, cancer cells switch from using their defective mitochondria to using metabolic activity in their cytoplasm to generate energy.
By stopping this switch of energy source, the drug causes the cancer cell to die. Lead researcher Professor Peter Sadler
of the University of Warwick's Department of chemistry, said explains:""Healthy cells generate their energy in organelles called mitochondria,
but cancer cells have defective mitochondria and are forced to generate energy through glycolysis in the cytoplasm.
Our new compounds work by attacking the energy balance in cancer cells.""Commenting on the drug's benefits
when compared to existing platinum-based drugs, such as Cisplatin, Professor Sadler says:""Platinum-based drugs are used in nearly 50%of all chemotherapeutic regimens
and exert their activity by damaging DNA and cannot select between cancerous and non-cancerous cells.
and a member of the Kavli Energy Nanosciences Institute, operated jointly by UC Berkeley and Berkeley Lab."The microphone and loudspeaker are some of the closest devices to commercial viability,
converting over 99 percent of the energy driving the device into sound, whereas today's conventional loudspeakers and headphones convert only 8 percent into sound.
2015 at a lab on KAIST's campus. They used high-frequency magnetic materials in a dipole coil structure to build a thin,
Arraythe research team used the Dipole Coil Resonance System (DCRS) to induce magnetic fields, which was developed by the team in 2014 for inductive power transfer over an extended distance.
The DCRS is composed of two (transmitting and receiving) magnetic dipole coils, placed in parallel, with each coil having a ferrite core
the dipole coil is very compact and has a less dimension. Therefore a crossed dipole structure has 2-dimension rather than 3-dimension of a crossed loop coil structure.
The DCRS has a great advantage to transfer power even when the resonance frequency changes in the range of 1%(Q factor is below 100).
Arraythe research team rearranged the two dipole coils from a parallel position to cross them
the level of magnetic flux is below the safety level of the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) guideline (27 T) for general public exposure to electromagnetic field (EMF).
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