Squeezed quantum communication
Erlangen, Germany (SPX) Sep 10, 2014 -
It could be difficult for the NSA to hack encrypted messages in the future - at least if a technology being investigated by scientists at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light in Erlangen and the University Erlangen-Nurnberg will be successful: quantum cryptography.
The physicists are now laying the foundation to make this technique, which can already be used for the generation ...
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A Metallic Alloy That is Tough and Ductile at Cryogenic Temperatures
Berkeley CA (SPX) Sep 10, 2014 -
A new concept in metallic alloy design - called "high-entropy alloys" - has yielded a multiple-element material that not only tests out as one of the toughest on record, but, unlike most materials, the toughness as well as the strength and ductility of this alloy actually improves at cryogenic temperatures. This multi-element alloy was synthesized and tested through a collaboration of researcher ...
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X-ray imaging paves way for novel solar cell production
Hamburg, Germany (SPX) Sep 10, 2014 -
The sharp X-ray vision of DESY's research light source PETRA III paves the way for a new technique to produce cheap, flexible and versatile double solar cells.
The method developed by scientists from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) in Roskilde can reliably produce efficient tandem plastic solar cells of many metres in length, as a team around senior researcher Jens W. Andreasen r ...
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A low-energy optical circuit for a new era of technology
Lausanne, Switzerland (SPX) Sep 10, 2014 -
Unlike electronic circuits, optical, or "photonic", circuits work with light rather than electricity, which makes them 10 to 100 times faster. They are also more energy-efficient because they show lower heat loss, better signal-to-noise ratios and are less susceptible to interference.
Used especially for communications (e.g. fiber optics), optical circuits may use tiny optical cavities as ...
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Layered graphene sandwich for next generation electronics
Manchester, UK (SPX) Sep 10, 2014 -
Writing in Nature Nanotechnology, the researchers have demonstrated how combining the two-dimensional materials in a stack could create perfect crystals capable of being used in next generation transistors.
Hexagonal boron nitride (hBN), otherwise known as white graphene, is one of a family of two-dimension materials discovered in the wake of the isolation of graphene at the University in ...
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Ultra-thin Detector Captures Unprecedented Range of Light
College Park MD (SPX) Sep 10, 2014 -
New research at the University of Maryland could lead to a generation of light detectors that can see below the surface of bodies, walls, and other objects. Using the special properties of graphene, a two-dimensional form of carbon that is only one atom thick, a prototype detector is able to see an extraordinarily broad band of wavelengths.
Included in this range is a band of light wavelen ...
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