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Chemistry News - November 2009 Archives
 | Chemists and physicists have succeeded in getting custom-shaped particles to interact and assemble in a controlled way in a liquid crystal. The research is reported in the journal Science. ...> Full Article |
South Korean scientists succeed in producing the polymers used for everyday plastics through bioengineering, rather than through the use of fossil fuel based chemicals, heralding the creation of environmentally conscious plastics.
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 | In three papers published back-to-back today in Science, scientists in a partnership between the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany, and the Centre de Regulacio Geṇmica in Barcelona, Spain, provide the first comprehensive picture of a minimal cell, based on an extensive quantitative study of the biology of the bacterium that causes atypical pneumonia, Mycoplasma pneumoniae. The study uncovers fascinating novelties relevant to bacterial biology and shows that even the simplest of cells is more complex than expected. ...> Full Article |
Researchers at the University of Illinois have developed a technique for fabricating 3-D, single-crystalline silicon structures from thin films by coupling photolithography and a self-folding process driven by capillary interactions.
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 | Two-dimensional carbon layers, so-called graphenes, are regarded as a possible substitute for silicon in the semiconductor industry. The electronic properties of these layers can be varied by "building in" specific arrays of holes in their structure. Physicists at Empa, together with chemists from the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz have, for the first time, succeeded in synthesizing a graphene-like porous polymer with atomic accuracy. ...> Full Article |
A group of researchers at the City College of New York is developing a new way to generate power for planes and automobiles based on materials known as piezoelectrics, which convert the kinetic energy of motion into electricity. They will present their concept later this month at the 62nd Annual Meeting of the American Physical Society's (APS) Division of Fluid Dynamics will take place from Nov. 22-24 at the Minneapolis Convention Center.
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 | Scientists at the Carnegie Institution have found for the first time that high pressure can be used to make a unique hydrogen-storage material. The discovery paves the way for a new approach to the hydrogen-storage problem. The researchers found that the normally nonreactive, noble gas xenon combines with molecular hydrogen under pressure to form a previously unknown solid with unusual bonding chemistry. The discovery debuts a new family of materials, which could boost hydrogen technologies. ...> Full Article |
 | An accidental discovery in a laboratory at Oregon State University has apparently solved a quest that over thousands of years has absorbed the energies of ancient Egyptians, the Han dynasty in China, Mayan cultures and more -- the creation of a near-perfect blue pigment. ...> Full Article |
 | If you're like most people, you probably think chemistry is too difficult to bother with outside of school and too clinical to be fun. But chemistry offers a magic to behold -- from fall foliage to the fundamentals of digestion -- as explained by educators Cathy Cobb and Monty L. Fetterolf in "The Joy of Chemistry: The Amazing Science of Familiar Things." ...> Full Article |
 | By applying epitaxial strain to thin films of bismuth ferrite, Berkeley Lab researchers have produced a lead-free alternative to the current crop of piezoelectric materials. ...> Full Article |
 | Small amounts of oil leave a fluorescent sheen on polluted water. Oil sheen is hard to remove, even when the water is aerated with ozone or filtered through sand. Now, a University of Utah engineer has developed an inexpensive new method to remove oil sheen by repeatedly pressurizing and depressurizing ozone gas, creating microscopic bubbles that attack the oil so it can be removed by sand filters. ...> Full Article |
The idea by Kansas State University's Wenqiao "Wayne" Yuan and Zhijian "Z.J." Pei is to grow algae in the ocean on very large, supporting platforms.
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Scientists have developed a simple, cheap, accurate test to find undetected landmines.
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Max Planck chemists are using a simple method to convert methane to methanol -- something that has the potential to exploit previously unused reserves of natural gas.
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 | Scientists in Washington, DC, are reporting development and successful tests of a new way for exploring the insides of living cells, the microscopic building blocks of all known plants and animals. They explode the cell while it is still living inside a plant or animal, vaporize its contents, and sniff. The study appears in online in ACS' journal Analytical Chemistry.
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 | In the quest to make hydrogen as a clean alternative fuel source, researchers have been stymied about how to create usable hydrogen that is clean and sustainable without relying on an intensive, high-energy process that outweighs the benefits of not using petroleum to power vehicles.
New findings from a team of researchers from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, however, show that photosynthesis may function as that clean, sustainable source of hydrogen. ...> Full Article |
Aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) and Raman, infrared and UV-visible spectroscopies pinpoint sub-nanometer clusters of tungsten oxide mixed with tiny amounts of zirconium as the active catalytic species in the catalyst. In lab tests, the clusters increased the activity of a poor catalyst by more than 100 times. Solid acid catalysts are more environmentally friendly than liquid catalysts, which evaporate, spill and cause corrosion. Tungstated zirconia's uses include the improvement of gasoline's octane content.
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 | University of Utah chemists demonstrated the first conclusive link between the size of catalyst particles on a solid surface, their electronic properties and their ability to speed chemical reactions. The study is a step toward the goal of designing cheaper, more efficient catalysts to increase energy production, reduce Earth-warming gases and manufacture a wide variety of goods from medicines to gasoline. ...> Full Article |
Harvard materials scientists have come up with what they believe is a new way to model the formation of glasses, a type of amorphous solid that includes common window glass.
...> Full Article
 | New insight into how nature handles some fundamental processes is guiding researchers in the design of tailor-made proteins for applications such as artificial photosynthetic centers, long-range electron transfers, and fuel-cell catalysts for energy conversion. ...> Full Article |
 | In all the world, there are about 200 types of zeolite, a compound of silicon, aluminum and oxygen that gives civilization such things as laundry detergent, kitty litter and gasoline. But thanks to computations by Rice University professor Michael Deem and his colleagues, it appears there are -- or could be -- more types of zeolites than once thought. ...> Full Article |
 | Common household chemical, also made naturally by living cells, appears to be involved in regulation of circadian rhythms, according to new study in PLoS ONE. ...> Full Article |
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Scientists locate apparent hydrothermal vents off Antarctica
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New fiber nanogenerators could lead to electric clothing
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Scientists discover quantum fingerprints of chaos
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Chemicals that eased one environmental problem may worsen another
Helping hydrogen: Student inventor tackles challenge of hydrogen storage
More, better biodiesel
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Researchers envision high-tech applications for 'multiferroic' crystals
Chemists create synthetic 'gene-like' crystals for carbon dioxide capture
Setting out to discover new, long-lived elements