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Here are 32 of the hundreds of articles we posted in the past week:

Vietnamese scientists come up with natural plastic
thanhniennews.com January 10th, 2009 They are convenient, water resistant and cheap. These qualities make plastic bags second to none as the packaging of choice for most products. However, they have huge disadvantages especially in how friendly they are to the environment. They are made from non-renewable sources - oil and gas - and they are not biodegradable, as it takes them between 500 and 1,000 years to decompose in natural conditions. Scientists, therefore, have long been trying to create biodegradable plastic (or bioplastic) as a solution. As part of the country's efforts to reduce the use of plastic bags, some local companies have imported technologies producing bioplastic from other countries like the US and Canada for hundreds of thousand dollars. Recently, research scientists from the Ho Chi Minh City-based University of Sciences have developed a material to make biodegradable plastic bags (or bioplastic bags) with several advantages over the imported ones. According to the result of a project initiated four years ago, the material not only can degrade fully in land within a short time but also make the cost of bags produced with it much cheaper, says Truong Phuoc Nghia, the group's leader. He says the material, known as nanocomposite, is a mix of thermoplastic starch (made from starch), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), a kind of polymer clay, and some food additives, adding that it is made with nanotechnology.

Researchers First to "See" Reactive Oxygen Species in Vital Enzyme: Mechanistic details revealed through unique light source technique
Brookhaven National Laboratory January 10th, 2009  Using two simultaneous light-based probing techniques at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, a team of researchers has illuminated important details about a class of enzymes involved in everything from photosynthesis to the regulation of biological clocks.

UAlbany NanoCollege and Commerce Technologies Create Joint Information Technology Workforce Development Program
UAlbany CNSE January 12th, 2009 Students to receive paid internship opportunities at CNSE partner tenant CommerceHub

Label free sensing with silicon nanowires
Sensors & Instrumentation KTN January 12th, 2009  Nanoscale electronic devices have the potential to achieve exquisite sensitivity as sensors for the direct detection of molecular interactions, thereby decreasing diagnostics costs and enabling previously impossible sensing in disparate field environments. Semiconducting nanowire-field effect transistors (NW-FETs) hold particular promise, though contemporary nanowire approaches are inadequate for realistic applications.

Analyzing the Edge 2009 Question and Answers
nextbigfuture.com January 12th, 2009 Ed Regis: Molecular nanotechnology: "But what if [molecular] nanotechnology in the radical and grandiose sense actually became possible? What if, indeed, it became an operational reality? That would be a fundamentally transformative development, changing forever how manufacturing is done and how the world works. Imagine all of our material needs being produced at trivial cost, without human labor, and with no waste. No more sweat shops, no more smoke-belching factories, no more grinding workdays or long commutes. The magical molecular assemblers will do it all, permanently eliminating poverty in the process."

University of Michigan and GM open $5M advanced battery research lab: Battery lab centerpiece of growing U-M and GM technical relationship
University of Michigan January 12th, 2009  Engineers at the University of Michigan have formalized an important relationship with General Motors to accelerate the design and testing of advanced batteries for electric vehicles.

Department of Energy Approves Construction Start of NSLS-II Project
Brookhaven National Laboratory January 12th, 2009  To advance its science mission that focuses on critical national challenges, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has approved the construction start of the state-of-the-art National Synchrotron Light Source II (NSLS-II) at Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Wireless microgrippers grab living cells in 'biopsy' tests
Johns Hopkins University January 12th, 2009 In experiments that pave the way for tiny mobile surgical tools activated by heat or chemicals, Johns Hopkins researchers have invented dust-particle-size devices that can be used to grab and remove living cells from hard-to-reach places without the need for electrical wires, tubes or batteries. Instead, the devices are actuated by thermal or biochemical signals.

EPA's Voluntary Reporting Program Fails to Deliver Data: Needed to Determine Safety of Nanomaterials, Report Shows
Environmental Defense Fund January 13th, 2009  Voluntary Approach Captures Only a Thin Slice of Nanomaterials in Use or Development in the U.S.

Simply Weird Stuff: Making Supersolids with Ultracold Gas Atoms
NIST January 13th, 2009 Physicists at the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI) of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Maryland have proposed a recipe for turning ultracold "boson" atoms�the ingredients of Bose-Einstein condensates�into a "supersolid," an exotic state of matter that behaves simultaneously as a solid and a friction-free superfluid. While scientists have found evidence for supersolids in complex liquid helium mixtures, a supersolid formed from such weakly interacting gas atoms would be simpler to understand, potentially providing clues for making a host of new "quantum materials" whose bizarre properties could expand physicists' notions of what is possible with matter.

Insights into Polymer Film Instability Could Aid High Tech Industries
NIST January 13th, 2009 While exploring the properties of polymer formation, a team of scientists at the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) has made a fundamental discovery* about these materials that could improve methods of creating the stable crystalline films that are widely used in electronics applications�and also offer insight into a range of other phenomena.

Super Sensitive Gas Detector Goes Down the Nanotubes
NIST January 13th, 2009 When cells are under stress, they blow off steam by releasing minute amounts of nitrogen oxides and other toxic gases. In a recent paper,* researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) described a new method for creating gas detectors so sensitive that some day they may be able to register these tiny emissions from a single cell, providing a new way to determine if drugs or nanoparticles harm cells or to study how cells communicate with one another. Based on metal oxide nanotubes, the new sensors are a hundred to 1,000 times more sensitive than current devices based on thin films and are able to act as multiple sensors simultaneously.

�Two-Faced� Bioacids Put a New Face on Carbon Nanotube Self-Assembly
NIST January 13th, 2009 Nanotubes, the tiny honeycomb cylinders of carbon atoms only a few nanometers wide, are perhaps the signature material of modern engineering research, but actually trying to organize the atomic scale rods is notoriously like herding cats. A new study* from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and Rice University, however, offers an inexpensive process that gets nanotubes to obediently line themselves up�that is, self-assemble�in neat rows, more like ducks.

New Tool Gives Researchers a Glimpse of Biomolecules in Motion
NIST January 13th, 2009 The ability of biomolecules to flex and bend is important for the performance of many functions within living cells. However, researchers interested in how biomolecules such as amino acids and proteins function have long had to make inferences from a series of X-ray-like "still pictures" of pure crystalline samples. Now, using a new technique based on terahertz (THz) spectroscopy, scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have recently taken the first step toward revealing the hidden machinations of biomolecules in water.*

New guidelines open up the potential of molecular diagnostics
Cordis January 13th, 2009 A new EU-funded research project is set to lead the way in creating top-quality healthcare standards for in vitro diagnostics, an area of medicine that could be of vital importance to personalised medicine.

NANOSCIENCE -- Defective circuits
Oak Ridge National Laboratory January 13th, 2009  Structural defects introduced into carbon nanotubes could lead the way to carbon nanotube circuits, research led by Vincent Meunier of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Computer Science and Mathematics Division shows. Individual carbon nanotubes are excellent conductors of electricity, but that conductivity goes away when they are connected together into circuits because the junctions act as barriers, and the connections are effective insulators. However, work conducted at the Department of Energy's Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences at ORNL and Mexico's National Laboratory for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Research shows that imperfections in the carbon lattice structure, which is typically hexagonal, improve conductivity between nanotubes.

Replisaurus to Collaborate with IMEC on 3D Integration Research
Replisaurus January 14th, 2009 Joint Development Program Will Employ S.E.T.'s High Accuracy FC300 System to Explore Advanced 3D Applications

Dudek and Catalyx Nanotech Teaming to Sequester Carbon and Produce 'Green' Hydrogen and Nanomaterials From Landfill Gas
Catalyx Nanotech, Inc. January 14th, 2009  CATALYX NANOTECH, INC., is teaming with Dudek to pursue low-cost, "green" high-grade graphite and hydrogen production with no by-products using a patented technology. Catalyx Nanotech, a privately funded company focused on nanotechnology applications, and Dudek, a California-focused environmental and engineering consulting firm, are seeking multiple landfills in Southern California on which to site production facilities. Catalyx Nanotech anticipates commencing production in the first plant in late 2009.

Nanotech in Your Vitamins: Report highlights FDA's regulatory challenges posed by nanomaterials
The Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies January 14th, 2009 The ability of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to regulate the safety of dietary supplements using nanomaterials is severely limited by lack of information, lack of resources and the agency's lack of statutory authority in certain critical areas, according to a new expert report released by the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies (PEN).

Infrared light visualizes nanoscale strain fields
Max-Planck-Institut f�r Biochemie January 15th, 2009  A joint team of researchers at CIC nanoGUNE (San Sebastian, Spain) and the Max Planck Institutes of Biochemistry and Plasma Physics (Munich, Germany) report the non-invasive and nanoscale resolved infrared mapping of strain fields in semiconductors. The method, which is based on near-field microscopy, opens new avenues for analyzing mechanical properties of high-performance materials or for contact-free mapping of local conductivity in strain-engineered electronic devices (Nature Nanotechnology, advanced online publication, 11 Jan. 2009).

Lack of thermoelectric effect is cool feature in carbon nanotubes
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign January 15th, 2009 Metallic carbon nanotubes have been proposed as interconnects in future electronic devices packed with high-density nanoscale circuits.

The future is 3-D liquid crystals
University of Cambridge January 15th, 2009  Simulation of the electric field surrounding a single MWCNT in vacuum.Dr Tim Wilkinson from the Cambridge University Department of Engineering's Photonics Research Group has made an exciting breakthrough. He has combined liquid crystals with vertically grown carbon nanotubes to create a reconfigurable three-dimensional liquid crystal device structure.

A fantastic voyage brought to life
sciencemode.com January 15th, 2009 "Our lab is creating biological nano-machines," says Dr. Peer. "These machines can target specific cells. In fact, we can target any protein that might be causing disease or disorder in the human body. This new invention treats the source, not the symptoms." Dr. Peer's recent paper reported on the device's ability to target leukocytes (immune cells) in the guts of mice with ulcerative colitis. Calling his new invention a submarine, Dr. Peer has developed a nano-sized carrier which operates like a GPS system to locate and target cells. In the case of Crohn's disease, for example, it will target overactive immune system cells in the gut. In other diseases such as cancer, the submarine can aim for and deliver material to specific cancer cells, leaving the surrounding healthy cells intact. While other researchers are working in the area of nano-medicine and drug delivery, Dr. Peer's submarines are among the first to combine a drug candidate with a drug delivery system. As the submarines float through the body, they latch onto the target cell and deliver their payload, a drug based on RNAi. This new kind of drug can affect faulty RNA machinery and reprogram cells to operate in normal ways. In essence, RNAi can essentially restore health to diseased cells or cause cells to die (like in the case of cancer cells).

Nanotech Safety High on Congress' Priority List: New House bill addresses need for more risk research, oversight
The Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies January 15th, 2009 The House Science and Technology Committee today introduced legislation that highlights the growing attention on Capitol Hill to the need to strengthen federal efforts to learn more about the potential environmental, health and safety (EHS) risks posed by engineered nanomaterials. Nanotechnology is an emerging technology that promises to usher in the next Industrial Revolution and is the focus of an annual $1.5 billion federal research investment.

Warming up to the Casimir force: The Casimir force between objects in a vacuum shows a complex dependence on temperature
Riken January 15th, 2009 When two uncharged objects are placed in a vacuum with no external fields, we wouldn't expect them to have any force between them other than gravity. Quantum electrodynamics says otherwise. It shows that tiny quantum oscillations in the vacuum will give rise to an attraction called the Casimir force (Fig. 1).

Free from approximations
Riken January 15th, 2009 A novel numerical technique permits researchers to study the interaction between elementary particles within a material without approximations

Large-Scale Nuclear Materials Study Shapes National Collaborations
University of Wisconsin-Madison January 15th, 2009  In Kumar Sridharan's laboratory on the University of Wisconsin-Madison engineering campus, just one ill-timed sneeze might have catapulted his next three years' worth of nuclear reactor materials research into oblivion.

U of T chemistry discovery brings organic solar cells a step closer
University of Toronto January 15th, 2009  Inexpensive solar cells, vastly improved medical imaging techniques and lighter and more flexible television screens are among the potential applications envisioned for organic electronics. Recent experiments conducted by Greg Scholes and Elisabetta Collini of University of Toronto's Department of Chemistry may bring these within closer reach thanks to new insights into the way molecules absorb and move energy. Their findings will be published in the prestigious international journal Science on January 16.

Easy assembly of electronic biological chips
Penn State January 15th, 2009 A handheld, ultra-portable device that can recognize and immediately report on a wide variety of environmental or medical compounds may eventually be possible, using a method that incorporates a mixture of biologically tagged nanowires onto integrated circuit chips, according to Penn State researchers.

Next generation cloaking device demonstrated
Duke University January 15th, 2009 A device that can bestow invisibility to an object by "cloaking" it from visual light is closer to reality. After being the first to demonstrate the feasibility of such a device by constructing a prototype in 2006, a team of Duke University engineers has produced a new type of cloaking device, which is significantly more sophisticated at cloaking in a broad range of frequencies.

Professor Sir Michael Pepper FRS joins the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering and the London Centre for Nanotechnology
London Centre for Nanotechnology press release January 16th, 2009 Professor Sir Michael Pepper has been appointed to the Pender Chair of Nanoelectronics at UCL (University College of London) where he will work on joint projects between the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering and the London Centre for Nanotechnology. His research will focus on semiconductors, nanostructures, fundamental terahertz technologies and their applications.

Lab-in-a-Cartridge for Fast and Accurate Detection of Cancer and Infectious Diseases
Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotech January 16th, 2009 Rapid, easy and affordable tests for cancer, avian flu and other infectious diseases move a step closer to patients as DYAMED Biotech Pte Ltd (Dyamed) licenses a unique all-in-one automated diagnostic system called MicroKit from the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (IBN). As part of its agreement with Exploit Technologies Pte Ltd (ETPL) - the A*STAR commercialization arm - Dyamed will set up a spin-off company to develop and produce a range of new diagnostic products.

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