The smallest semiconductor composed of only 27 atoms, the Cd14Se13 cluster, has an interesting core-cage structure

05-Aug-2022

A semiconductor is a material whose conductivity lies somewhere between that of a conductor and an insulator. This property allows semiconductors to serve as the base material for modern electronics and transistors. It is no understatement that the technological progress in the latter part of the ...

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Microscopic understanding of wettability can be achieved at the molecular level using 'vibrational sum-frequency generation spectroscopy'

28-Apr-2022

Wettability of the material is the ability of a liquid to maintain contact with a solid surface, and it is proportional to hydrophilicity and inversely proportional to hydrophobicity. It is one of the most important properties of a solid, and understanding the wettability of different substrates ...

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Quantum charging will cut the charging time of electric vehicles from ten hours to three minutes

22-Mar-2022

Whether it's photovoltaics or fusion, sooner or later, human civilization must turn to renewable energies. This is deemed inevitable considering the ever-growing energy demands of humanity and the finite nature of fossil fuels. As such, much research has been pursued in order to develop ...

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What a toy: a tiny gyroscope that would fit in a human cell and that can be controlled from the outside

01-Feb-2022

In cooperation with an international team at the Institute for Basic Science in South Korea, theoretical chemists Dr. Chandan Das and Professor Lars Schäfer from Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) have constructed a molecular gyroscope that can be controlled remotely by light. They also succeeded in ...

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Microscopic understanding of solvation structure reveals heterogeneity in the superconcentrated water-in-salt electrolytes

01-Dec-2021

Lithium-ion batteries are notorious for being a fire hazard due to their flammable organic electrolytes. As such, there has been much effort to utilize water-based electrolytes as a safer alternative. However, this is hampered by the problem of water molecules undergoing electrolysis into ...

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Nickel-cobalt metal dimer on nitrogen-doped carbon can catalyze electrolysis under both acidic and basic conditions

23-Nov-2021

The limited reservoir of fossils fuels and the ever-increasing threats of climate change have encouraged researchers to develop alternative technologies to produce eco-friendly fuels. Green hydrogen generated from the electrolysis of water using renewable electricity is considered a ...

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Liquid nitrogen quenching introduces tensile-strain on the surface of oxide support, stabilizing ultra-high loading of single metal atom sites

15-Oct-2021

While hydrogen is widely suggested as an alternative fuel with zero carbon emission, the majority of commercial hydrogen fuel production is obtained from the refining of fossils fuels. The limited reservoir of fossils fuels and their negative impact on the environment has encouraged researchers ...

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New discovery allows for scalable production of fold-free and ad-layer free single-crystal graphene

27-Aug-2021

A team of researchers led by Director Rod Ruoff at the Center for Multidimensional Carbon Materials (CMCM) within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS), including graduate students at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), have achieved growth and characterization of ...

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Placing a 2D Bose-Einstein condensate in the vicinity of a graphene layer confers superconductivity to the material

20-Jul-2021

Superconductivity is a physical phenomenon where the electrical resistance of a material drops to zero under a certain critical temperature. Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) theory is a well-established explanation that describes superconductivity in most materials. It states that Cooper pairs of ...

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An extensive internal void enables a secure encapsulation, delivery, and storage of guest molecules as large as 4 nanometers

11-Nov-2020

Famous Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí once said, "Anything created by human beings is already in the great book of nature." Among different man-made architectures and art, spherical structures and shapes have been the most fantastical geometrical form that fascinated the figments of the human ...

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