Saturday 28 June 2014

Berkeley Lab Researchers Create Nanoparticle Thin Films That Self-Assemble in One Minute

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The days of self-assembling nanoparticles taking hours to form a film over a microscopic-sized wafer are over. Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have devised a technique whereby self-assembling nanoparticle arrays can form a highly ordered thin film over macroscopic distances in one minute. Upon solvent annealing, supramolecules made from gold nanoparticles and block copolymers will self-assemble into highly ordered thin films in one minute. Ting Xu, a polymer scientist with Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division, led a study in which supramolecules based on block copolymers were combined with gold nanoparticles to create nanocomposites that under solvent annealing quickly self-assembled into hierarchically-structured thin films spanning an area of several square centimeters. The technique is compatible with current nanomanufacturing processes and has the potential to generate new families of optical coatings for applications in a wide number of areas including solar energy, nanoelectronics and computer memory storage. This technique could even open new avenues to the fabrication of metamaterials, artificial nanoconstructs that possess remarkable optical properties. Ting Xu holds joint appointments with Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division and UC Berkeley’s Departments of Materials Sciences and Engineering, and Chemistry. (Photo by Roy Kaltschmidt) “Our

The post Berkeley Lab Researchers Create Nanoparticle Thin Films That Self-Assemble in One Minute has been published on Technology Org.

 
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Confidence falls in Big Bang signal

Science Focus

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Scientists who claimed to have found a pattern in the sky left by the super-rapid expansion of space just fractions of a second after the Big Bang say they are now less confident of their result. 
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 » see original post http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-27935479#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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Monogram Crab Nebula in Taurus Stickers

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tagged with: crbneb, astronomy, messier 1, neutron stars, star ejecta, pulsars, supernovae explosions, galaxies, outer space pictures, monogram initials, heavens, european southern observatory, eso, vista, monograms, initialled, monogrammed

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series A great outer space picture featuring a three colour composite of the well-known Crab Nebula (also known as Messier 1), as observed with the FORS2 instrument in imaging mode in the morning of November 10, 1999.

It's the remnant of a supernova explosion at a distance of about 6,000 light-years, observed almost 1,000 years ago, in the year 1054. It contains a neutron star near its center that spins 30 times per second around its axis (see below).

In this picture, the green light is predominantly produced by hydrogen emission from material ejected by the star that exploded. The blue light is predominantly emitted by very high-energy ("relativistic") electrons that spiral in a large-scale magnetic field (so-called synchrotron emission). It's believed that these electrons are continuously accelerated and ejected by the rapidly spinning neutron star at the centre of the nebula and which is the remnant core of the exploded star.

This pulsar has been identified with the lower/right of the two close stars near the geometric center of the nebula, immediately left of the small arc-like feature, best seen in ESO Press Photo eso9948.

Technical information: ESO Press Photo eso9948 is based on a composite of three images taken through three different optical filters: B (429 nm; FWHM 88 nm; 5 min; here rendered as blue), R (657 nm; FWHM 150 nm; 1 min; green) and S II (673 nm; FWHM 6 nm; 5 min; red) during periods of 0.65 arcsec (R, S II) and 0.80 (B) seeing, respectively. The field shown measures 6.8 x 6.8 arcminutes and the images were recorded in frames of 2048 x 2048 pixels, each measuring 0.2 arcseconds. North is up; East is left.

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image code: crbneb

ESO/J. Emerson/VISTA www.eso.org
Reproduced under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

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Orion Arising

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Orion's belt runs just along the horizon, seen through Earth's atmosphere and rising in this starry snapshot from low Earth orbit on board the International Space Station. The belt stars, Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka run right to left and Orion's sword, home to the great Orion Nebula, hangs above his belt, an orientation unfamiliar to denizens of the planet's northern hemisphere. That puts bright star Rigel, at the foot of Orion, still higher above Orion's belt. Of course the brightest celestial beacon in the frame is Sirius, alpha star of the constellation Canis Major. The station's Destiny Laboratory module is in the foreground at the top right.

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Ngc 3603 Emission Nebula Wall Stickers

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Amazing photo of emission nebula. Great space photography gits.

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New galaxies seen with the Hubble Space Telescope iPad Folio Cases

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tagged with: celestial bodies, exploration, galaxy, natural science, natural world, nebula, nobody, outer space, science, space exploration and research, star cluster, stars

ImageID: 42-24078213 / STScI / NASA/Corbis / New galaxies seen with the Hubble Space Telescope Wide Field Camera

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Nanotube forests drink water from arid air

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Rice graduate student Sehmus Ozden holds a carbon nanotube forest. Ozden treated nanotube arrays to harvest water in the same way beetles do in the desert, by combining hydrophilic and hydrophobic surfaces. Photo by Jeff Fitlow     If you don’t want to die of thirst in the desert, be like the beetle. Or have a nanotube cup handy. New research by scientists at Rice University demonstrated that forests of carbon nanotubes can be made to harvest water molecules from arid desert air and store them for future use. The invention they call a “hygroscopic scaffold” is detailed in a new paper in the American Chemical Society journal Applied Materials and Interfaces. Researchers in the lab of Rice materials scientist Pulickel Ajayan found a way to mimic the Stenocara beetle, which survives in the desert by stretching its wings to capture and drink water molecules from the early morning fog. Electron microscope images show the superhydrophobic (water-repelling) side (top) of a hygroscopic scaffold created at Rice University. The bottom image shows the hydrophilic (water-loving) side.They modified carbon nanotube forests grown through a process created at Rice, giving the nanotubes a superhydrophobic (water-repelling) bottom and a hydrophilic (water loving) top. The forest attracts water molecules from the air

The post Nanotube forests drink water from arid air has been published on Technology Org.

 
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Moonshadow Print

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A massive solar eclipse observed on a distant moon.

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Initialled Dumbbell Nebula Constellation Vulpecula Stickers

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Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series A great photo from deep space featuring the Dumbbell Nebula - also known as Messier 27 or NGC 6853. It's a typical planetary nebula and is located in the constellation Vulpecula (The Fox).

The distance is rather uncertain, but is believed to be around 1,200 light-years. It was first described by the French astronomer and comet hunter Charles Messier who found it in 1764 and included it as no. 27 in his famous list of extended sky objects.

Despite its class, the Dumbbell Nebula has nothing to do with planets. It consists of very rarefied gas that has been ejected from the hot central star (well visible on this photo), now in one of the last evolutionary stages. The gas atoms in the nebula are excited (heated) by the intense ultraviolet radiation from this star and emit strongly at specific wavelengths.

This image is the beautiful by-product of a technical test of some FORS1 narrow-band optical interference filters. They only allow light in a small wavelength range to pass and are used to isolate emissions from particular atoms and ions.

In this three-colour composite, a short exposure was first made through a wide-band filter registering blue light from the nebula. It was then combined with exposures through two interference filters in the light of double-ionized oxygen atoms and atomic hydrogen. They were colour-coded as “blue”, “green” and “red”, respectively, and then combined to produce this picture that shows the structure of the nebula in “approximately true” colours.



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Image code: dmbblneb

ESO/J. Emerson/VISTA www.eso.org
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Enlarged Region of The Omega Nebula Room Graphic

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Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series Like the fury of a raging sea, this bubbly ocean of glowing hydrogen, oxygen, and sulphur gas lies in the extremely massive and luminous molecular nebula Messier 17.
This Hubble photograph captures a small region within Messier 17 (M17), a hotbed of star formation. M17, also known as the Omega or Swan Nebula, is located about 5500 light-years away in the Sagittarius constellation.
Ultraviolet radiation is carving and heating the surfaces of cold hydrogen gas clouds and the warmed surfaces glow orange and red. The intense heat and pressure causes some material to stream away from the surface, creating the glowing veil of even hotter green-coloured gas that masks background structures. The colours in the image represent various gases. Red represents sulphur; green, hydrogen; and blue, oxygen.

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image code: eroton

Image credit: NASA, the ACS Science Team

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Nebulae Photo by Hubble Telescope Case For The iPad Mini

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Photo of nebulae taken by the Hubble Telescope. A stunning colorful photo of deep space.

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