Graphene Flagship

University of Adelaide researchers have developed a process for turning waste plastic bags into a high-tech nanomaterial. The innovative nanotechnology uses non-biodegradable plastic grocery bags to make ‘carbon nanotube membranes’ highly sophisticated and expensive materials with a variety of potential advanced applications including filtration, sensing, energy storage and a range of biomedical innovations. “Non-biodegradable plastic

Smartphone heads-up display systems that project navigation and other information onto car windshields are seen as a way to reduce driver distraction. The HeadsUP! from tech start-up NeXt takes a different approach. Rather than relying on projection, this system is based around a transparent display mounted in front of the windshield that gives drivers control of their

Indium-Free Transparent, Flexible Electrodes Developed Flexible, transparent electronics are closer to reality with the creation of graphene-based electrodes at Rice University. The lab of Rice chemist James Tour lab has created thin films that could revolutionize touch-screen displays, solar panels and LED lighting. The research was reported in the online edition of ACS Nano. Flexible,

Thousands of genes influence most diseases In a provocative new perspective piece, Stanford researchers say that disease genes are spread uniformly across the genome, not clustered in specific molecular pathways, as has been thought. A core assumption in the study of disease-causing genes has been that they are clustered in molecular pathways directly connected to

Tech companies are creating plenty of jobs for robots   The knock against many technology companies is they create too few jobs in their own countries. That complaint needs serious amending. Tech companies are creating plenty of jobs for robots. Foxconn, the leading manufacturer of electronics in the world — which makes Apples iPhones and

Physicians are using smart phones to diagnose diseases, check blood cell counts and identify pathogens in drinking water. Many people already use their smart­phones as far more than mere telephones—as gadgets for Web surfing, e-mailing or listening to music. Some scientists are now turning them into handheld tools to diagnose cancer or infectious disease, track treatment

An important technological development The newest entry in ARM‘s Cortex line, the Cortex-M0+ is claimed to be the world’s most energy-efficient processor, delivering 32-bit performance on around one third of the typical energy requirements of an 8- or 16-bit processor. Targeting low-cost sensors and microcontrollers, the M0+ will come with a very modest price tag

When people take the psychedelic drug LSD, they sometimes feel as though the boundary that separates them from the rest of the world has dissolved. Now, the first functional magnetic resonance images (fMRI) of people’s brains while on LSD help to explain this phenomenon known as “ego dissolution.” As researchers report in the Cell Press

Researchers at the University of Maryland have made a block of linden wood transparent, which they say will be useful in fancy building materials and in light-based electronics systems. Materials scientist Liangbing Hu (also a member of the Maryland NanoCenter and the University of Maryland’s Energy Research Center) and his team at the University of

Researchers at the University of California San Diego have demonstrated the world’s first laser based on an unconventional wave physics phenomenon called bound states in the continuum. The technology could revolutionize the development of surface lasers, making them more compact and energy-efficient for communications and computing applications. The new BIC lasers could also be developed