Wind turbine blades could someday be recycled into sweet treats

Wind power is an increasingly popular form of renewable energy. However, when it's time to replace the huge turbine blades that convert wind into electricity, disposal is a problem. Now, scientists report a new composite ...

New glass-ceramic emits light when under mechanical stress

Researchers have created a new glass-ceramic that emits light in response to mechanical stress, a property known as mechanoluminescence. With further development, the new material could be used to create a light source that ...

Printing optical chips as a layer cake

Faster, more energy-efficient ICT, or sensors to detect anything between beginning fruit rot and microscopic cracks in glass fibers: photonic technology holds great promises for the future. To deliver on those promises, a ...

Smuggling light through opaque materials

Electrical engineers at Duke University have discovered that changing the physical shape of a class of materials commonly used in electronics and near- and mid-infrared photonics—chalcogenide glasses— can extend their ...

New method to produce composites with 'shape memory'

Skoltech researchers have investigated a promising type of composite material in terms of their shape memory behavior—how they resume their original shape following deformation if exposed to the right temperature or other ...

Liquid core fibers: A data river runs through them

Data and signals can be transmitted quickly and reliably with glass fibers—as long as the fiber does not break. Strong bending or tensile stress can quickly destroy it. An Empa team has now developed a fiber with a liquid ...

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