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Theories of high-temperature superconductivity violate Pauli Principle
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Scientists seeking to explain high-temperature superconductivity have been violating the Pauli exclusion principle, a team of researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Rutgers University report. Any theory that does not embrace the Pauli principle has a lot of explaining to do, they say. The basic organizing precept behind the […]
Point-contact spectroscopy deepens mystery of heavy-fermion superconductors
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Theoretical understanding of heavy-fermion superconductors has just slipped a notch or two, says a team of experimentalists. Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Los Alamos National Laboratory recently used a sensitive technique called point-contact spectroscopy to explore Andreev reflection between a normal metal and a heavy-fermion superconductor. Conventional theories […]
Membraneless fuel cell is tiny, versatile
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – A fuel cell designed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign can operate without a solid membrane separating fuel and oxidant, and functions with alkaline chemistry in addition to the more common acidic chemistry. Like a battery, a fuel cell changes chemical energy into electrical energy. While most fuel cells […]
Nanotechnologist plans to build things with bricklike corn molecules
UI nanotechnologist Graciela Wild Padua is intrigued by the bricklike shape of the corn zein molecule. She thinks it’s particularly suited as a building block for tiny structures small enough to be measured in nanometers: cages, for example, that could carry biocompounds to targeted sites in the human body or scaffolds on which to grow […]
Membraneless fuel cell is tiny, versatile
Membraneless fuel cell is tiny, versatile James E. Kloeppel, Physical Sciences Editor 217-244-1073; kloeppel@illinois.edu 3/15/2005 STORY The system designed by Paul Kenis, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, uses a Y-shaped microfluidic channel in which two liquid streams containing fuel and oxidant merge and flow between catalyst-covered electrodes without mixing. E.R. Choban, L.J. Markoski, […]
Bill Hammack, U. of I. engineering professor, named Jefferson Science Fellow
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Bill Hammack, a professor of chemical and of biomolecular engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, has been named a Jefferson Science Fellow by the U.S. Department of State. Hammack is one of five tenured research scientists and engineers chosen to work alongside senior diplomats and policymakers for a year in […]
Temperature inside collapsing bubble four times that of sun
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Using a technique employed by astronomers to determine stellar surface temperatures, chemists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have measured the temperature inside a single, acoustically driven collapsing bubble. Their results seem out of this world. “When bubbles in a liquid get compressed, the insides get hot – very hot,” said […]
Chemists synthesize molecule that helps body battle cancers, malaria
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – The first synthesis of QS-21A, a medicinally important molecule that helps the body battle disease, has been achieved by chemists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In clinical trials, QS-21A has been shown to significantly improve the body’s immune response in vaccine therapies against aggressive diseases such as melanoma, breast cancer, […]
High-fidelity patterns form spontaneously when solvent evaporates
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Resembling neatly stacked rows of driftwood abandoned by receding tides, particles left by a confined, evaporating droplet can create beautiful and complex patterns. The natural, pattern-forming process could find use in fields such as nanotechnology and optoelectronics. “A lot of work in nanotechnology has been directed toward the bottom-up imposition of patterns […]
High-intensity ultrasound creates hollow nanospheres and nanocrystals
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Using high-intensity ultrasound, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have created hollow nanospheres and the first hollow nanocrystals. The nanospheres could be used in microelectronics, drug delivery and as catalysts for making environmentally friendly fuels. “We use high-intensity ultrasound to generate nanoparticles of molybdenum disulfide or molybdenum oxide, which bind […]
Illinois student programmers to compete in ‘Battle of the Brains’
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Three computer science students from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will travel to Shanghai, China, April 3-7 to participate in the Association for Computing Machinery International Collegiate Programming Contest. The students, John Carrino, Stephen Downing and Jeffrey Tamer, defeated teams from Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Pennsylvania and Tennessee to earn […]
National Science Olympiad to take place May 20-21 at Illinois
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – About 2,400 students in middle school and high school are expected to compete in the 21st annual National Science Olympiad May 20-21 at the University of Illinois. The students, representing more than 120 teams of champions from across the country, will compete in more than three dozen events, such as bridge building, […]