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News tagged with thin films

Harnessing plasmonics, engineers weld nanowires with light

At the nano level, researchers at Stanford have discovered a new way to weld together meshes of tiny wires. Their work could lead to exciting new electronics and solar applications. To succeed, they called ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Feb 06, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (11) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Hacking the SEM: Crystal phase detection for nanoscale samples

(PhysOrg.com) -- Custom modifications of equipment are an honored tradition of the research lab. In a recent paper, two materials scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology describe how ...

Physics / General Physics

created Jan 25, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Flaky graphene makes reliable chemical sensors

Scientists from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the company Dioxide Materials have demonstrated that randomly stacked graphene flakes can make an effective chemical sensor.

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Jan 17, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Magnetic actuation enables nanoscale thermal analysis

Polymer nano-films and nano-composites are used in a wide variety of applications from food packaging to sports equipment to automotive and aerospace applications. Thermal analysis is routinely used to analyze ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Jan 12, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Demonstration of ultra-high speed piezoelectric thin film with nanodomain structure

The Japan Synchrotron Radiation Research Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology, the National Institute for Materials Science, and Kyoto University confirmed for the first time in the world that it is possible to achieve ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Dec 22, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

New path to flex and stretch electronics: Researchers develop solution-based fabrication technique

(PhysOrg.com) -- Imprinting electronic circuitry on backplanes that are both flexible and stretchable promises to revolutionize a number of industries and make "smart devices" nearly ubiquitous. Among the ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Dec 13, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Giant piezoelectric effect to improve MEMS devices

Researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering and the Materials Research Institute at Penn State are part of a multidisciplinary team of researchers from universities and national laboratories ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Dec 02, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Researchers demonstrate fully printed carbon nanotube transistor circuits for displays

Since the invention of liquid crystal displays in the mid-1960s, display electronics have undergone rapid transformation. Recently developed organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) have shown several advantages over LCDs, including ...

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Nov 30, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (6) | comments 0

Graphene ink created for ink-jet printing of electronic components

(PhysOrg.com) -- A group of UK scientists has created a graphene ink that can be used to ink-jet print electronic devices such as thin film transistors.

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Nov 25, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (14) | comments 6 | with audio podcast report

First proof of single atomic layer material with zero electrical resistance

A research group at the NIMS International Center for Materials Nanoarchitectonics (MANA) has proved that the electrical resistance of a metal single atomic layer on a silicon surface becomes zero by superconductivity.

Physics / Superconductivity

created Nov 24, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 8

Nanowrinkles, nanofolds yield strange hidden channels

Wrinkles and folds are ubiquitous. They occur in furrowed brows, planetary topology, the surface of the human brain, even the bottom of a gecko's foot. In many cases, they are nature's ingenious way of packing ...

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Nov 23, 2011 | popularity 3.4 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Scientists carve nanowires out of ultrananocrystalline diamond thin films

A team of scientists working at Argonne National Laboratory's (ANL) Center for Nanoscale Materials has successfully carved ultrananocrystalline diamond (UNCD) thin films into nanowires, boosting the material's functionality ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Nov 04, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (4) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Plasma in bags

Using plasmas, sealed plastic bags can be modified at atmospheric pressure so that human cells can adhere to and reproduce on their walls. Cell culture bags of this kind are an important aid for research and ...

Technology / Engineering

created Nov 03, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Researchers build transparent, super-stretchy skin-like sensor (w/ video)

Imagine having skin so supple you could stretch it out to more than twice its normal length in any direction - repeatedly - yet it would always snap back completely wrinkle-free when you let go of it. You ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Oct 24, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

New discovery could make fuel, plastics production more energy efficient and cost effective

A University of Minnesota team of researchers has overcome a major hurdle in the quest to design a specialized type of molecular sieve that could make the production of gasoline, plastics and various chemicals more cost effective ...

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Oct 12, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Thin film

Thin films are thin material layers ranging from fractions of a nanometre to several micrometres in thickness. Electronic semiconductor devices and optical coatings are the main applications benefiting from thin film construction.

Work is being done with ferromagnetic thin films for use as computer memory. It is also being applied to pharmaceuticals, via thin film drug delivery. Thin-films are used to produce thin-film batteries.

Ceramic thin films are in wide use. The relatively high hardness and inertness of ceramic materials make this type of thin coating of interest for protection of substrate materials against corrosion, oxidation and wear. In particular, the use of such coatings on cutting tools can extend the life of these items by several orders of magnitude.

Research is being done on a new class of thin film inorganic oxide materials, called amorphous heavy-metal cation multicomponent oxide, which could be used to make transparent transistors that are inexpensive, stable, and environmentally benign.

For more information about Thin film, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Related topics: solar cells