This finding is likely to spawn new developments in emerging technologies such as low-power electronics based on the spin of electrons or ultrafast quantum computers.
"The electrons in topological insulators have unique quantum properties that many scientists believe will be useful for developing spin-based electronics and quantum computers.
In Science Advances, the researchers report the discovery of an optical effect that allows them to"tune"the energy of electrons in these materials using light,
which arises from quantum interference between the different simultaneous paths electrons can take through a material
#A resonator for electrons More than two thousand years ago the Greek inventor and philosopher Archimedes already came up with the idea of using a curved mirror to reflect light in such a way as to focus it into a point-legend has it that he used this technique to set
A team of physicists at ETH Zurich, working within the framework of the National Centre of Competence in Research Quantum Science and Technology (NCCR QSIT), have managed now to build a resonator that focuses electrons rather than light waves.
which electrons are free to move only in a single plane. At one end of that plane there is a so-called quantum dot:
a tiny trap for electrons, only a hundred nanometers wide, in which owing to quantum mechanics the electrons exist in well-defined energy states similar to those of an atom.
"At the other end, just a few micrometers away, a bent electrode acts as a curved mirror that reflects electrons
Better materialsthe possibility to focus electrons in this way was investigated already in 1997 at Harvard university. The ETH researchers,
"and consequently the electrons can move undisturbed a hundred times longer.""This, in turn, allows the quantum mechanical wave nature of the electrons to become very clearly visible,
which was not the case in those earlier works. In their experiments, the physicists detect this wave nature by measuring the current flowing from the quantum dot to the curved mirror.
"Our results show that the electrons in the resonator do not just fly back and forth, but actually form a standing wave
Differently from light waves, the spin of the electrons also causes them to behave as tiny magnets.
Indeed, the researchers were able to show that the interaction between the electrons in the quantum dot
Basic science could also benefit from the electron resonators realized by the ETH researchers, for instance in studies of the Kondo effect.
when many electrons together interact with the magnetic moment of an impurity in a material. With the help of a resonator and a quantum dot simulating such an impurity,
Light goes infinitely fast with new on-chip material Electrons are so 20th century. In the 21st century, photonic devices,
In the metal state, electrons move freely, while in the insulator state, electrons cannot flow.
This on/off transition, inherent to vanadium dioxide, is also the basis of computer logic and memory.
This work will be reported at the IEEE International Electron Device Meeting, the leading forum for reporting technological breakthroughs in the semiconductor and electronic device industry, in December."
"The electrons in topological insulators have unique quantum properties that many scientists believe will be useful for developing spin-based electronics and quantum computers.
In Science Advances, the researchers report the discovery of an optical effect that allows them to"tune"the energy of electrons in these materials using light,
which arises from quantum interference between the different simultaneous paths that electrons can take through a material
"Graphene, a one-atom-thick, two-dimensional sheet of carbon atoms, is known for moving electrons at lightning speed across its surface without interference.
and stop electrons at will via band-gaps, as they do in computer chips. As a semimetal, graphene naturally has no band-gaps,
a technique using electrons (instead of light or the eyes) to see the characteristics of a sample,
Data gathered from the electron signatures allowed the researchers to create images of the material's dimensions and orientation.
and extent to which electrons scattered throughout the material.""We're looking at fundamental physical properties to verify that it is, in fact,
When electron-laden lithium ion diffuse across this gap and offload their electrons at the other side,
. While Oncor Electric is still sending electrons to its 7. 5 million customers throughout Texas using high-voltage transmission lines,
The electrons are sent then by microgrids to keep those operations running. The concept is catching on nationally,
generating protons and electrons as well as oxygen gas. The photocathode recombines the protons and electrons to form hydrogen gas.
NO EXPLOSIONS A key part of the design is the plastic membrane, which keeps the oxygen and hydrogen gases separate.
and electrons to pass through. The new system uses such a 62.5-nanometer-thick Tio2 layer to effectively prevent corrosion
and electrons and is a key to the device high efficiency. The photoanode was grown onto a photocathode
says Schwab. e all know quantum mechanics explains precisely why electrons behave weirdly. Here wee applying quantum physics to something that is relatively big,
This phase, characterized by an unusual ordering of electrons, offers possibilities for new electronic device functionalities and could hold the solution to a longstanding mystery in condensed matter physics having to do with high-temperature superconductivityhe ability
first consider a crystal with electrons moving around throughout its interior. Under certain conditions, it can be energetically favorable for these electrical charges to pile up in a regular,
In addition to charge, electrons also have a degree of freedom known as spin. When spins line up parallel to each other (in a crystal, for example
But what if the electrons in a material are ordered not in one of those ways?
And like the cuprates, iridates are electrically insulating antiferromagnets that become increasingly metallic as electrons are added to
where an additional amount of energy is required to strip electrons out of the material. For decades, scientists have debated the origin of the pseudogap
In other words, the excitation of the molecules of graphene by the laser pulses causes the electrons in the material to heat up,
And, as the electrons in the laser-excited graphene do not cool down rapidly because they do not easily recouple with the graphene lattice,
constant laser pulse excitation of an area of graphene quickly results in superfast electron distribution within the material at constantly elevated electron temperatures.
This rapid conversion to electron heat is converted then into a voltage at the p-n junction of two graphene regions.
This is because their operation is dependent upon overcoming of the binding electron energy inherent in the material for an incoming photon to dislodge an electron
In the ICFO device, the continued excitation of electrons above this band-gap level results in the much faster and easier movement of them when subjected to incoming photons to create an electric current.
"Electron flow at molecular length-scales is dominated by quantum tunneling, "said professor"The efficiency of the tunneling process depends intimately on the degree of alignment of the molecule discrete energy levels with the electrode continuous spectrum.
and reconfiguring them so they would only hold a single electron each. The spin of the electron sets a code of 0 or 1,
and an external current and microwave field control the qubits and make them interact as needed."
and reconfiguring them so they would only hold a single electron each. The spin of the electron sets a code of 0 or 1,
and an external current and microwave field control the qubits and make them interact as needed."
examined the electron transport function of the sensors, whilst contributing researchers in the US and Belgium established that boron atoms were melded into the graphene lattice
that the electrons, excited by the light are accumulated in the negative electrode. In the future, experts intend to create a mart box
which involves the gaining of electrons. The reduced-graphene oxide-coated materials were found to be particularly sensitive to detecting nitrogen dioxide
and uses it to excite electrons to higher energy levels. These excited electrons, and the empty spaces they leave behind,
are then capable of driving forward the two half-reactions required to split water into oxygen and hydrogen.
electron spins can be aligned to generate ferroelectric polarization. Most pressure cells, however, apply stress in all directions equally. he biggest challenge we faced was accurately controlling uniaxial stress at temperatures as low as 3 kelvin,
a better conductor of electrons and lithium ions when it is very thin. Aluminum powders were placed in sulfuric acid saturated with titanium oxysulfate.
and electrons to get in and out. The result is an electrode that gives more than three times the capacity of graphite (1. 2 Ah/g) at a normal charging rate
Raman spectroscopy and transport measurements on the graphene/boron nitride heterostructures reveals high electron mobilities comparable with those observed in similar assemblies based on exfoliated graphene.
uses a beam of electrons to track where heat is produced and how it dissipates with nanometer accuracy.
Electrons passing through a sample excite collective charge oscillations called plasmons. Monitoring the energy required to excite the plasmons enables measuring local variations in a sample density,
e transferred electrons from the dopant-potassium-to the surface of the black phosphorus, which confined the electrons
and allowed us to manipulate this state. Potassium produces a strong electrical field which is required what we to tune the size of the band gap.
This process of transferring electrons is known as doping and induced a giant Stark effect, which tuned the band gap allowing the valence
a UNSW Research Fellow and the lead author of the Nature paper. ee morphed those silicon transistors into quantum bits by ensuring that each has only one electron associated with it.
We then store the binary code of 0 or 1 on the pinof the electron, which is associated with the electron tiny magnetic field,
he added. Dzurak noted that the team had recently atented a design for a full-scale quantum computer chip that would allow for millions of our qubits,
"Graphene, a one-atom-thick, two-dimensional sheet of carbon atoms, is known for moving electrons at lightning speed across its surface without interference.
and stop electrons at will via band-gaps, as they do in computer chips. As a semimetal, graphene naturally has no band-gaps,
a technique using electrons (instead of light or the eyes) to see the characteristics of a sample,
Data gathered from the electron signatures allowed the researchers to create images of the material's dimensions and orientation.
and extent to which electrons scattered throughout the material.""We're looking at fundamental physical properties to verify that it is, in fact,
thereby transferring the energy of the photons to the electrons in the graphene. These"hot electrons"increase the electrical resistance of the detector
and generate rapid electric signals. The detector can register incident light in just 40 picoseconds these are billionths of a second.
This optical universal detector is already being used at the HZDR for the exact synchronization of the two free-electron lasers at the ELBE Center for High-power Radiation Sources with other lasers.
thereby transferring the energy of the photons to the electrons in the graphene. These"hot electrons"increase the electrical resistance of the detector
and generate rapid electric signals. The detector can register incident light in just 40 picoseconds these are billionths of a second.
This optical universal detector is already being used at the HZDR for the exact synchronization of the two free-electron lasers at the ELBE Center for High-power Radiation Sources with other lasers.
) Plasmonic devices harness clouds of electrons called surface plasmons to manipulate and control light. Potential applications for the nanotweezer include improved-sensitivity nanoscale sensors
Conventional computers use electrons to process information. However, the performance might be ramped up considerably by employing the unique quantum properties of electrons
and photons, said Vladimir M. Shalaev, co-director of a new Purdue Quantum Center, scientific director of nanophotonics at the Birck Nanotechnology Center and a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering."
which rely on the drift and diffusion of electrons and their holes through semiconducting material, memristor operation is based on ionic movement,
The ionic memory mechanism brings several advantages over purely electron-based memories, which makes it very attractive for artificial neural network implementation,
"Ions are also much heavier than electrons and do not tunnel easily, which permits aggressive scaling of memristors without sacrificing analog properties."
which is the basis for controlling electrons in computers, phones, medical equipment and other electronics.
or differences in how much energy it takes to excite an electron in the material.""When we put them together,
you form a band gap mismatch--that creates a so-called'potential barrier'that stops electrons."
caused by the difference in electron movement as currents move next to and past the hairlike boron nitride nanotubes.
"Imagine the electrons are like cars driving across a smooth track, "Yap says.""They circle around and around,
With their aligned atoms, the graphene-nanotube digital switches could avoid the issues of electron scattering."
"You want to control the direction of the electrons, "Yap explains, comparing the challenge to a pinball machine that traps,
slows down and redirects electrons.""This is difficult in high speed environments, and the electron scattering reduces the number and speed of electrons."
"Much like an arcade enthusiast, Yap says he and his team will continue trying to find ways to outsmart
or change the pinball setup of graphene to minimize electron scattering. And one day, all their tweaks could make for faster computers--and digital pinball games--for the rest of us s
First, the control voltage mediates how electrons pass through a boundary that can flip from an ohmic (current flows in both directions) to a Schottky (current flows one way) contact and back.
The principle was tested at the HZDR on a typical laboratory laser as well as on the free-electron laser FELBE.
generating protons and electrons as well as oxygen gas. The photocathode recombines the protons and electrons to form hydrogen gas.
A key part of the JCAP design is the plastic membrane, which keeps the oxygen and hydrogen gases separate.
and electrons to pass through. The new complete solar fuel generation system developed by Lewis and colleagues uses such a 62.5-nanometer-thick Tio2 layer to effectively prevent corrosion
protons, and electrons and is a key to the high efficiency displayed by the device.
#Building the electron superhighway: Vermont scientists invent new approach in quest for organic solar panels and flexible electronics University of Vermont scientists have invented a new way to create
what they are calling an electron superhighway in an organic semiconductor that promises to allow electrons to flow faster
But the basic science of how to get electrons to move quickly and easily in these organic materials remains murky.
what they are calling"an electron superhighway"in one of these materials--a low-cost blue dye called phthalocyanine--that promises to allow electrons to flow faster and farther in organic semiconductors.
"Roughly speaking, an exciton is displaced a electron bound together with the hole it left behind.
the UVM team was able to observe nanoscale defects and boundaries in the crystal grains in the thin films of phthalocyanine--roadblocks in the electron highway."
"We have discovered that we have hills that electrons have to go over and potholes that they need to avoid,
"these stacked molecules--this dish rack--is the electron superhighway.""Though excitons are charged neutrally --and can't be pushed by voltage like the electrons flowing in a light bulb--they can, in a sense, bounce from one of these tightly stacked molecules to the next.
This allows organic thin films to carry energy along this molecular highway with relative ease,
information is transported via the motion of electrons. In this scheme, the charge of the electron is used to transmit a signal.
In a magnetic insulator, a spin wave is used instead. Spin is a magnetic property of an electron.
A spin wave is caused by a perturbation of the local magnetisation direction in a magnetic material.
Such a perturbation is caused by an electron with an opposite spin, relative to the magnetisation.
An electron can flow through the platinum, but not in the YIG since it is an insulator.
However, if the electron collides on the interface between YIG and platinum, this influences the magnetisation at the YIG surface and the electron spin is transferred.
This causes a local magnetisation direction generating a spin wave in the YIG. Spin wave detection The spin waves that the researchers send into the YIG are detected by the platinum strip on the other side of the YIG.
and transfers its spin to an electron in the platinum. This influences the motion of the electron, resulting in an electric current that the researchers can measure.
The researchers already studied the combination of platinum and YIG in previous research. From this research it was found that
or cooling of the platinum-YIG interface, depending on the relative orientation of the electron spins in the platinum and the magnetisation in the YIG G
The work demonstrates the potential of low energy electron holography as a non-destructive, single-particle imaging technique for structural biology.
Low energy electron holography is a technique of using an electron wave to form holograms. Similar to light optical holography
"The low energy electron holography has two major advantages over conventional microscopy. First, the technique doesn't employ any lenses,
Second, low energy electrons are harmless to biomolecules, "Longchamp said. In many conventional techniques such as transmission electron microscopy, the possible resolution is limited by high-energy electrons'radiation damage to biological samples.
Individual biomolecules are destroyed long before an image of high enough quality can be acquired. In other words, the low permissible electron dose in conventional microscopies is not sufficient to obtain high-resolution images from a single biomolecule.
However in low energy electron holography, the employed electron doses can be much higher--even after exposing fragile molecules like DNA or proteins to a electron dose more than five orders of magnitude higher
than the critical dose in transmission electron microscopy, no radiation damage could be observed. Sufficient electron dose in low energy electron holography makes imaging individual biomolecules at a nanometer resolution possible.
In Longchamp's experiment, the tobacco mosaic virions were deposited on a freestanding, ultraclean graphene, an atomically thin layer of carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb lattice.
which is conductive, robust and transparent for low energy electrons. To obtain the high-resolution hologram, an atomically sharp, tungsten tip acts as a source of a divergent beam of highly coherent electrons.
When the beam hits the sample, part of the beam is scattered and the other part is affected not.
"Since low energy electron holography is a method very sensitive to mechanical disturbance, the current nanometer resolution could be improved to angstrom (one ten billionth of a meter)
electrons flow from the anode through a circuit outside the battery and back into the cathode.
Having lost the electrons that are generating the current, some of the atoms in the anode--an electrically conductive metal like lithium--become ions that then travel to the cathode,
and magnetization in order to understand how to control electron spins (electron magnetic moments) and to create the new generation of electronics.
In spin electronics-or spintronics-information is coded via the electron spin, which could be directed along
that the spins of the electron and of other charged particles are very difficult to control.
During the experiments scientists bombarded the experimental samples with muons (particles that resemble electrons, but are 200 times heavier) and analyzed their dissipation scattering.
or high-energy reservoir of electrons. Lithium can do that, as the charge carrier whose ions migrate into the graphite
This finding is likely to spawn new developments in emerging technologies such as low-power electronics based on the spin of electrons or ultrafast quantum computers.
"The electrons in topological insulators have unique quantum properties that many scientists believe will be useful for developing spin-based electronics and quantum computers.
In Science Advances, the researchers report the discovery of an optical effect that allows them to"tune"the energy of electrons in these materials using light,
which arises from quantum interference between the different simultaneous paths electrons can take through a material
and electrons to read data. This could enable the size of storage cells to be reduced to atomic dimensions.
Standard memory devices are based on electrons which are displaced by applying voltage. The development of ever smaller and more energy-efficient storage devices according to this principle,
"Electrons are roughly 1000 times lighter than ions and so they move much more easily under the influence of an external voltage.
while the electrons remain mobile and can be used to read the storage status."The trick:
"The tunnel effect enables us to move electrons through the ultra-thin layer with very little energy,
and electrons, on the other hand, at voltages far below one volt. This way, ions can be used specifically for storing and electrons specifically for reading data.
The researchers also reported that their research had another very interesting element. The new resistance-based storage devices could even simulate brain structures.
They suggested that magnetic atoms introduced into a superconductor must create special states of excitation around themselves-electron-hole standing waves named after their discoverers.
One promising option is to use topologically protected electron states that are resistant to decoherence.
The theory predicts that such non-Abelian anyons may occur in a two-dimensional"liquid"of electrons in a superconductor under the influence of a local magnetic field.
The electron liquid thus becomes degenerate, i e. the electrons can have different states at the same energy level.
The superposition of several anyons cannot be affected without moving them, therefore they are protected completely from disturbances e
This phase, characterized by an unusual ordering of electrons, offers possibilities for new electronic device functionalities and could hold the solution to a longstanding mystery in condensed matter physics having to do with high-temperature superconductivity--the ability
first consider a crystal with electrons moving around throughout its interior. Under certain conditions, it can be energetically favorable for these electrical charges to pile up in a regular,
In addition to charge, electrons also have a degree of freedom known as spin. When spins line up parallel to each other (in a crystal, for example),
But what if the electrons in a material are ordered not in one of those ways?
And like the cuprates, iridates are electrically insulating antiferromagnets that become increasingly metallic as electrons are added to
where an additional amount of energy is required to strip electrons out of the material. For decades, scientists have debated the origin of the pseudogap
but uses photons--the quanta of light--instead of electrons. The biggest advantage of using photons is the absence of interactions between them.
As a consequence, photons address the data transmission problem better than electrons. This property can primarily be used for in computing where IPS (instructions per second) is the main attribute to be maximized.
--Free carriers (electrons and electron holes) place serious restrictions on the speed of signal conversion in the traditional integrated photonics.
Film in 4-D with ultrashort electron pulses Physicists of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) in Munich shorten electron pulses down to 30 femtoseconds duration.
A team from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) and Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics (MPQ) has managed now to shorten electron pulses down to 28 femtoseconds in duration.
Sharp images of moving atoms Electrons are odd particles: they have both wave and particle properties.
They create beams of electron pulses, which can, due to their extremely short flashing, provide us with very sharp images of moving atoms and electrons.
Nevertheless, some of the fastest processes still remained blurred. Those who want to explore the microcosm
Scientists from the Laboratory for Attosecond Physics at LMU and MPQ have succeeded now in producing ultrashort electron pulses with a duration of only 28 femtoseconds.
If such electrons meet a molecule or atom, they are diffracted into specific directions due to their short wavelength.
the physicists applied their ultrashort electron pulses to a biomolecule in a diffraction experiment. It is planned to use those electron beams for pump-probe experiments:
an optical laser pulse is sent to the sample, initiating a response. Shortly afterwards the electron pulses produce a diffraction image of the structure at a sharp instant in time.
A large amount of such snapshots at varying delay times between the initiating laser pulses and the electron pulses then results in a film showing the atomic motion within the substance.
Thanks to the subatomic wavelength of the electrons, one therefore obtains a spatial image as well as the dynamics.
Altogether this results in a four-dimensional impression of molecules and their atomic motions during a reaction. ith our ultrashort electron pulses
we are now able to gain a much more detailed insight into processes happening within solids and molecules than before,
"Now the physicists aim to further reduce the duration of their electron pulses. The shorter the shutter speed becomes, the faster the motions
The aim of the scientists is to eventually observe even the much faster motions of electrons in light-driven processes o
which use photons instead of electrons to transport and manipulate information, offer many advantages compared to traditional electronic links found in today computers.
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