Day: December 12, 2023

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) Protein-splitting enzymes play an important role in many physiological processes. Such proteases are generally present in an inactive state, only becoming activated under certain conditions. Some are linked to diseases like infections or cancer, making it important to have methods that can selectively detect active...

Dec 11, 2023 (Nanowerk News) When water vapor meets metal, the resulting corrosion can lead to mechanical problems that harm a machine’s performance. Through a process called passivation, it also can form a thin inert layer that acts as a barrier against further deterioration. Either way, the exact chemical reaction...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) The increasing use of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) — and a proposal in the European Union to ban the entire class of materials — highlights the need for an updated and standardized approach to assess human and environmental impacts of CNTs and products that contain them,...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) Chiral materials interact with light in very precise ways that are useful for building better displays, sensors and more powerful devices. However, engineering properties such as chirality reliably at scale is still a significant challenge in nanotechnology. Rice University scientists in the lab of Junichiro...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk Spotlight) Frequent blood draws are the uncomfortable reality for millions living with diabetes. These diagnostic finger pricks disrupt daily life and come with health risks like infection. Researchers have long sought a minimally invasive way to sample the clear fluid that surrounds our cells, known as...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) For the first time ever, wireless millirobots navigated a narrow blood vessel both along and against arterial flow. Researchers from the University of Twente and Radboudumc inserted the screw-shaped robots in a detached aorta with kidneys where they controlled them using a robotically controlled rotating...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) In a world-first, researchers from the GrapheneX-UTS Human-centric Artificial Intelligence Centre at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) have developed a portable, non-invasive system that can decode silent thoughts and turn them into text. The technology could aid communication for people who are unable to...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) Some Covid-19 vaccines safely and effectively used lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) to deliver messenger RNA to cells. A new MIT study shows that different nanoparticles could be used for a potential Alzheimer’s disease (AD) therapy. In tests in multiple mouse models and with cultured human cells,...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) When you look up at the sky and see clouds of wondrous shapes, or struggle to peer through dense, hazy fog, you’re seeing the results of ‘Mie scattering’, which is what happens with light interacts with particles of a certain size. There is a growing...

Dec 12, 2023 (Nanowerk News) In every physical system, energy and environment interact, which is why non-Hermitian systems are common. In the context of physics and engineering, a "non-Hermitian system" refers to a situation where the interaction between energy and its environment doesn't follow a conventional, balanced pattern. Normally, in...