Lifeboat Foundation

Advanced photonic nanostructures are well on their way to revolutionising quantum technology for quantum networks based on light. Researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute have now developed the first building blocks needed to construct complex quantum photonic circuits for quantum networks. This rapid development in quantum networks is highlighted in an article in the journal Nature.

Quantum technology based on light (photons) is called quantum photonics, while electronics is based on electrons. Photons (light particles) and electrons behave differently at the quantum level. A quantum entity is the smallest unit in the microscopic world. For example, photons are the fundamental constituent of light and electrons of electric current. Electrons are so-called fermions and can easily be isolated to conduct current one electron at a time. In contrast photons are bosons, which prefer to bunch together. But since information for quantum communication based on photonics is encoded in a single photon, it is necessary to emit and send them one at a time.

A team of scientists engineered a nanoparticle to help remove the toxins found in a wide variety of snake bites. This could impact the estimated 4.5 million people who are bitten by snakes each year, and the 100,000 who die from the venom.

The speed with which microbes in a simplified ecosystem absorb the nanomaterials is raising concerns about the effect on organisms higher in the food chain.

The things that can be done with 3D printing never cease to amaze. To the casual observer with only a passing knowledge of the technology, it appears on the surface to be an interesting method of producing plastic odds and ends, and sometimes metal parts – but 3D printing is so much more, as anyone who follows the progression of the technology on a regular basis knows. The things it is capable of producing are often hard to wrap one’s mind around – especially when you look at 3D printing on the nanoscale.

A group of scientists from Lithuania, France and Australia are busy studying 3D printing on a very small scale. As a newly published paper entitled “Optically Clear and Resilient Free-Form μ-Optics 3D-Printed via Ultrafast Laser Lithography” explains, 3D printing is capable of creating functional objects that are impossible to produce via conventional manufacturing techniques, and structures at the miniature, micro- and nanoscales are no exception.

Nice. I want one.

A revamped and rebranded NanoFabrication Kingston has launched with the goal of increasing activity outside of Queen’s University.

“We want to be open to the eastern Ontario community, industry and government as well as academia outside of Queen’s to make, characterize and test devices and samples that are small,” said Rob Knobel, Queen’s University professor and a lead researcher at NanoFabrication Kingston.

Continue reading “Big plans for nanotechnology” »

In Brief:

• Predictions from the co-chair of the World Economic Forum’s Future Council, Melanie Walker, say we’ll soon enter a post-hospital world due to advances in personalized medicine, health monitoring, and nanotechnology.
• New and evolving technologies in medical science convince Walker we’ll live in a society not dependent on hospitals by 2030.

As the world of medicine is increasingly changed by biology, technology, communications, genetics, and robotics, predicting the outlook of the next few decades of medicine becomes harder. But that is exactly what Melanie Walker of the World Economic Forum does, and she predicts a bright new future for healthcare.

A simple technique for producing oxide nanowires directly from bulk materials could dramatically lower the cost of producing the one-dimensional (1D) nanostructures.

That could open the door for a broad range of uses in lightweight structural composites, advanced sensors, electronic devices – and thermally-stable and strong battery membranes able to withstand temperatures of more than 1,000 degrees Celsius.

The technique uses a solvent reaction with a bimetallic alloy – in which one of the metals is reactive – to form bundles of nanowires (nanofibers) upon reactive metal dissolution.

Continue reading “New low-cost technique converts bulk alloys to oxide nanowires” »

Scientists show nanoscale modifications to the edge region of nanocontacts to nanowires can be used to engineer the electrical function of the interfaces.

Research by scientists at Swansea University is helping to meet the challenge of incorporating nanoscale structures into future semiconductor devices that will create new technologies and impact on all aspects of everyday life.

Dr Alex Lord and Professor Steve Wilks from the Centre for Nanohealth led the collaborative research published in Nano Letters. The research team looked at ways to engineer electrical contact technology on minute scales with simple and effective modifications to nanowires that can be used to develop enhanced devices based on the nanomaterials. Well-defined electrical contacts are essential for any electrical circuit and electronic device because they control the flow of electricity that is fundamental to the operational capability.

Everyday materials that are being scaled down to the size of nanometres (one million times smaller than a millimetre on a standard ruler) by scientists on a global scale are seen as the future of electronic devices. The scientific and engineering advances are leading to new technologies such as energy producing clothing to power our personal gadgets and sensors to monitor our health and the surrounding environment.

Continue reading “New research helps to make the most of nanoscale catalytic effects for nanotechnology” »