Earth

Rice University researchers have found a way to stitch graphene and hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) into a two-dimensional quilt that offers new paths of exploration for materials scientists.

The technique has implications for application of graphene materials in microelectronics that scale well below the limitations of silicon determined by Moore's Law.

Scientists broadly agree that global warming may threaten the survival of many plant and animal species; but global warming did not kill the Monteverde golden toad, an often cited example of climate-triggered extinction, says a new study. The toad vanished from Costa Rica's Pacific coastal-mountain cloud forest in the late 1980s, the apparent victim of a pathogen outbreak that has wiped out dozens of other amphibians in the Americas.

Random thermal fluctuations in magnetic memory can be harnessed to reduce the energy required to store information, according to an experiment reported in the current issue of Physical Review Letters. The development could lead to computer memory that operates at significantly lower power than conventional devices. Markus Münzenberg of Universität Göttingen and Jagadeesh Moodera of MIT describe the potential route to greener magnetic memory in a Viewpoint in the latest issue of APS Physics (physics.aps.org).

Nitrogen is vital for all plant life, but increasingly the planet is paying a heavy price for the escalating use of nitrogen fertilizer.

Excess nitrogen from fertilizer runoff into rivers and lakes causes algal blooms that create oxygen-depleted dead zones, such as the 6,000 to 7,000 square mile zone in the Gulf of Mexico, and nitrogen in the form of nitrous oxide is a potent greenhouse gas.

Centuries ago, scientists began reducing the physics of the universe into a few, key laws described by a handful of parameters. Such simple descriptions have remained elusive for complex biological systems – until now.

Emory University biophysicist Ilya Nemenman has identified parameters for several biochemical networks that distill the entire behavior of these systems into simple equivalent dynamics. The discovery may hold the potential to streamline the development of drugs and diagnostic tools, by simplifying the research models.

The massive, 8.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Chile Feb. 27 occurred in an offshore zone that was under increased stress caused by a 1960 quake of magnitude 9.5, according to geologist Jian Lin of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI).

The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) has been dominated for its first half century by a hunt for unusual radio signals. But as he prepares for the publication of his new book The Eerie Silence: Are We Alone?, Paul Davies tells Physics World readers why bold new innovations are required if we are ever to hear from our cosmic neighbours.

MADISON — Exerting delicate control over a pair of atoms within a mere seven-millionths-of-a-second window of opportunity, physicists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison created an atomic circuit that may help quantum computing become a reality.

Quantum computing represents a new paradigm in information processing that may complement classical computers. Much of the dizzying rate of increase in traditional computing power has come as transistors shrink and pack more tightly onto chips — a trend that cannot continue indefinitely.

Scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) and the University of Illinois—Urbana Champaign recently reported a new technique for directly writing composites of nanoparticles and polymers. Recent years have seen significant advances in the properties achieved by both these materials, and so researchers have begun to blend these materials into nanocomposites that access the properties of both materials. Forming these nanocomposites into structures has been tricky since each nanocomposite would require a particular set of solvents or a particular surface coating.

Princeton engineers have made a breakthrough in an 80-year-old quandary in quantum physics, paving the way for the development of new materials that could make electronic devices smaller and cars more energy efficient.

Proton beam radiation therapy shows encouraging results for patients with locally advanced sinonasal malignancies, according to a study presented at the Multidisciplinary Head and Neck Cancer Symposium, sponsored by AHNS, ASCO, ASTRO and SNM.

A three-year field program now underway is measuring carbon distributions and primary productivity in the Northwest Atlantic Ocean to help scientists worldwide determine the impacts of a changing climate on ocean biology and biogeochemistry. The study, Climate Variability on the East Coast (CliVEC), will also help validate ocean color satellite measurements and refine biogeochemistry models of ocean processes.

Life can be scary for endangered loggerhead sea turtles immediately after they hatch. After climbing out of their underground nest, the baby turtles must quickly traverse a variety of terrains for several hundred feet to reach the ocean.

In a paper appearing in the Feb. 24 issue of the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A, Virginia Tech Engineering Science and Mechanics Professor Hassan Aref, and his colleague Johan Roenby at the Technical University of Denmark shed new light on the chaotic motion of a solid body moving through a fluid. They claim to have discovered two basic mechanisms that lead to chaotic motion of the body as it interacts with its vortex wake. The work may lead to better understanding and control of real body-vortex interactions.

MADISON, WI, FEBRUARY 22, 2010 — Combined mechanisms of transport have important applications—transport of nutrients across cell membranes in plants and animals, the aeration of agricultural soils, performance of chemical reactors, the design of membranes for desalting brackish water, and the design of clay membranes for retaining dangerous chemicals. Because mass transport of fluid constituents has important roles in biology, physics, and chemistry, one would assume that such transport would be well understood by the scientific community.