ScienceDaily: Top Technology News

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• Asymmetry may provide clue to superconductivity
• Researchers estimate ice content of crater at moon's south pole
• Soon after the Big Bang, heavier elements emerge: Tin-100, a doubly magic nucleus
• All things big and small: The brain's discerning taste for size
• Graphene is a tunable plasmonic medium
• Megapixel camera? Try gigapixel
• Taming light with graphene
• Gold nanoparticles capable of 'unzipping' DNA
• Stars, jets and batteries: Multi-faceted magnetic phenomenon confirmed in the laboratory for the first time
• Solar nanowire array may increase percentage of sun's frequencies available for energy conversion
• Very Large Telescope takes a close look at the War and Peace Nebula

Asymmetry may provide clue to superconductivity Posted: 20 Jun 2012 11:33 AM PDT Physicists are reporting intriguing new details regarding the quirky electronic properties of high-temperature superconductors (HTS). They discovered an asymmetric electronic order that extends into the superconducting temperature range in a recently discovered iron-based HTS. The asymmetric feature also bears a striking resemblance to the "pseudogap" order found in copper-based HTSs.

Researchers estimate ice content of crater at moon's south pole Posted: 20 Jun 2012 11:11 AM PDT NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft has returned data that indicate ice may make up as much as 22 percent of the surface material in a crater located on the moon's south pole. The team of NASA and university scientists using laser light from LRO's laser altimeter examined the floor of Shackleton crater. They found the crater's floor is brighter than those of other nearby craters, which is consistent with the presence of small amounts of ice. This information will help researchers understand crater formation and study other uncharted areas of the moon.

Soon after the Big Bang, heavier elements emerge: Tin-100, a doubly magic nucleus Posted: 20 Jun 2012 10:33 AM PDT A few minutes after the Big Bang the universe contained no other elements than hydrogen and helium. Physicists have now succeeded in producing tin-100, a very unstable yet important element for understanding the formation of heavier elements.

All things big and small: The brain's discerning taste for size Posted: 20 Jun 2012 10:33 AM PDT The brain organizes objects based on their physical size, with a specific region of the brain reserved for recognizing large objects and another reserved for small objects, according to a new article. These findings could have major implications for fields like robotics, and could lead to a greater understanding of how the brain organizes and maps information.

Graphene is a tunable plasmonic medium Posted: 20 Jun 2012 10:33 AM PDT With a beam of infrared light, scientists have sent ripples of electrons along the surface of graphene and demonstrated that they can control the length and height of these oscillations, called plasmons, using a simple electrical circuit. This is the first time anyone has observed plasmons on graphene, sheets of carbon just one atom thick, and an important step toward using plasmons to process and transmit information in spaces too tight to use light.

Megapixel camera? Try gigapixel Posted: 20 Jun 2012 10:31 AM PDT By synchronizing 98 tiny cameras in a single device, electrical engineers have developed a prototype camera that can create images with unprecedented detail. The camera's resolution is five times better than 20/20 human vision over a 120 degree horizontal field. The new camera has the potential to capture up to 50 gigapixels of data, which is 50,000 megapixels. By comparison, most consumer cameras are capable of taking photographs with sizes ranging from 8 to 40 megapixels.

Taming light with graphene Posted: 20 Jun 2012 10:30 AM PDT Scientists have visualized the trapping and confinement of light on graphene, making a sheet of carbon atoms the most promising candidate for optical information processing on the nano-scale, optical detection, and ultrafast optoelectronics.

Gold nanoparticles capable of 'unzipping' DNA Posted: 20 Jun 2012 08:32 AM PDT Gold nanoparticles with a slight positive charge work collectively to unravel DNA's double helix. This finding has ramifications for gene therapy research and the emerging field of DNA-based electronics.

Stars, jets and batteries: Multi-faceted magnetic phenomenon confirmed in the laboratory for the first time Posted: 20 Jun 2012 08:32 AM PDT Magnetic instabilities play a crucial role in the emergence of black holes and other cosmic phenomena. The confirmation of such a magnetic instability – the Tayler instability – was successfully achieved for the first time. The findings should be able to facilitate construction of large liquid-metal batteries, which are under discussion as cheap storage facilities for renewable energy.

Solar nanowire array may increase percentage of sun's frequencies available for energy conversion Posted: 20 Jun 2012 07:10 AM PDT Using a nanowire substrate to anchor advanced photovoltaic materials, researchers are able to alleviate strains between materials that otherwise would shorten life spans for photovoltaic products.

Very Large Telescope takes a close look at the War and Peace Nebula Posted: 20 Jun 2012 05:31 AM PDT ESO's Very Large Telescope has taken the most detailed image so far of a spectacular part of the stellar nursery called the War and Peace Nebula. The view shows many hot young stars, glowing clouds of gas and weird dust formations sculpted by ultraviolet radiation and stellar winds.

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