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Low-cost fibers remove trace atrazine from drinking water
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – A new generation of high surface-area porous materials for removing atrazine from water supplies has been developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The low-cost and wear-resistant fibers also can remove the hazardous contaminants chloroform and trichloroethylene, both byproducts of the commonly used chlorine disinfection process. “We’ve shown that […]
University to decommission research reactor
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has begun the process of decommissioning its nuclear research reactor. The process will take several years to complete and will be carried out under the scrutiny of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Department of Energy. Built in 1959, the research reactor was placed in […]
Asteroid named for U. of I. astronomy professor
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – James B. Kaler, professor emeritus of astronomy at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, now has even more reason to be gazing at the night sky. He has had an asteroid named after him. Asteroid 17851 Kaler was discovered on May 1, 1998, with the Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking system in Haleakala, Hawaii. […]
Asymmetric feature shows puzzling face for superconductivity
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – The weird behavior of electrons tunneling across an atomically flat interface within a cuprate superconductor has defied explanation by theories of high-temperature superconductivity. As will be reported in the journal Physical Review Letters, a team of scientists led by physics professor James Eckstein at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has found […]
Silicon-based photodetector is sensitive to ultraviolet light
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – By depositing thin films of silicon nanoparticles on silicon substrates, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have fabricated a photodetector sensitive to ultraviolet light. Silicon-based ultraviolet sensors could prove very handy in military, security and commercial applications. “Silicon is the most common semiconductor, but it has not been useful for […]
Production of high-fidelity entangled photons exceeds 1 million per second
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Like virtuosos tuning their violins, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have tuned their instruments and harmonized the production of entangled photons, pushing rates to more than 1 million pairs per second. The brighter and purer entangled states could assist researchers in applications involving quantum information processing – such as […]
DARPA funds new photonic research center at Illinois
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has received a grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to create a photonic research center to develop ultra-fast light sources for high-speed signal processing and optical communications systems. The grant will provide $6.2 million in funding over four years. The Hyper-Uniform Nanophotonic Technology Center […]
Printable silicon for ultrahigh performance flexible electronic systems
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – By carving specks of single crystal silicon from a bulk wafer and casting them onto sheets of plastic, scientists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have demonstrated a route to ultrahigh performance, mechanically flexible thin-film transistors. The process could enable new applications in consumer electronics – such as inexpensive wall-to-wall displays […]
Dislocation creates ‘whirlpool’ that pulls surface atoms into crystal
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Developing novel ways to control the motion of atoms on surfaces is essential for the future of nanotechnology. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have found a phenomenon of dislocation-driven nucleation and growth that creates holes that spiral into a surface and pull atoms into crystalline solids. The newly […]
Nation remains vulnerable to power blackouts, thanks to political impasse
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – As the peak electricity season approaches, little has been done in Washington to prevent a recurrence of last August’s power failure that produced a huge blackout in the Northeast, an expert at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign says. Legislative steps to improve and enforce compliance with standards of reliability for electrical […]
Strong magnetic field converts nanotube from metal to semiconductor and back
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – By threading a magnetic field through a carbon nanotube, scientists have switched the molecule between metallic and semiconducting states, a phenomenon predicted by physicists some years ago, but never before clearly seen in individual molecules. In the May 21 issue of the journal Science, researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign […]
Measurement clarifies role between protein structure and cell adhesion
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Scientists studying the adhesive properties of the neural cell adhesion molecule (NCAM) – a protein that helps bind the nervous system together – have found that two opposing models of cell adhesion are both correct. “Our extremely sensitive technique allows us to directly measure how these proteins bind to one another, and […]