A Virginia family received the keys to their new 3D-printed home just in time for Christmas. The home is Habitat for Humanity’s first 3D-printed home in the nation, according to a Habitat news release. The 1,200-square-foot home has three bedrooms, two full baths and was built from concrete.
A large, unconventional anomalous Hall resistance in a new magnetic semiconductor in the absence of large-scale magnetic ordering has been demonstrated by Tokyo Tech materials scientists, validating a recent theoretical prediction. Their findings provide new insights into the anomalous Hall effect.
An international scientific group with outstanding Valencian participation has managed to measure for the first time oscillations in the brightness of a magnetar during its most violent moments. In just a 10th of a second, the magnetar released energy equivalent to that produced by the sun in 100,000 years. The observation was carried out without human intervention, thanks to an artificial intelligence system developed at the Image Processing Laboratory (IPL) of the University of Valencia.
The material that the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft returned from asteroid Ryugu is the most pristine sample we’ve ever gotten our hands on.
Tests at two laboratories show that the dark grains that the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft collected from the carbon-rich near-Earth asteroid 162,173 Ryugu are the most primitive materials known in the solar system.
“In this body you see hydrated materials and signs of organics from very early in the formation of the solar system — that’s exciting!” says Deborah Domingue (Planetary Science Institute), who was not involved in those studies but did earlier analysis of remote sensing data of Ryugu.
Up to 90% of patients who undergo open abdominal or pelvic surgery develop postoperative adhesions, or scar tissue. Minimally invasive laparoscopic surgical approaches can reduce the severity of the adhesions, but the scar tissue still forms. The cellular response to injury—even intentional injury, such as surgery to repair a problem—results in a cascade of molecules pouring to the site to heal the tissue. But the molecules, working quickly to close the wound, often go too far and bind the wound to nearby healthy tissue. Depending on the location, the resulting scar tissue can cause chronic pain, bowel obstruction and even death.
There may be a potential solution available soon, according to researchers from Southern Medical University in China. They have developed an injectable hydrogel that can plug up wounds without sticking to off target tissue, effectively preventing postoperative adhesions.
Their approach, tested in rats and rabbits, was published on Nov. 18 in Advanced Functional Materials.
Technologists envisage an electronically interconnected future that will depend on cheap, lightweight, flexible devices. Efforts to optimize the semiconductor materials needed for these electronic devices are therefore necessary. Researchers from the University of Tsukuba have reported a record-breaking germanium (Ge) thin film on a plastic substrate that offers flexibility without compromising performance. Their findings are published in ACS Applied Electronic Materials.
Ge is a popular semiconductor for use in transistors because it has high charge carrier mobility (charge carrier refers to the electrons and electron holes that move through the material). Ge can also be processed at the relatively low temperature of ~500 degrees Celsius and has a low Young’s modulus, which means it is a softer alternative to commonly used materials such as silicon.
Ge thin films can be grown using the solid-phase crystallization technique. These thin films are polycrystalline, meaning they are made up of many Ge crystals. In general, larger crystals lead to greater carrier mobilities because bigger crystals form fewer grain boundaries that obstruct the current. Recent increases in grain size have therefore led to effective Ge thin-film transistors on rigid substrates such as glass.
Astronomers have produced the most comprehensive image of radio emission from the nearest actively feeding supermassive black hole to Earth.
The emission is powered by a central black hole in the galaxy Centaurus A, about 12 million light years away.
As the black hole feeds on in-falling gas, it ejects material at near light-speed, causing ‘radio bubbles’ to grow over hundreds of millions of years.
Little planetary embryos formed these rocky worlds.
A new study suggests Earth and Mars formed from colliding material in the inner Solar System, which could shape planetary formation theories.
Micro-electromechanical systems or MEMS are tiny integrated devices that combine mechanical and electrical components. Traditional manufacturing techniques such as milling, turning, and molding become impractical at small scales so MEMS devices are fabricated using the same batch processing techniques used to fabricate integrated circuits. These devices can range in size from a few microns to several millimeters.
Because MEMS devices are a hybrid of mechanical and electronic mechanisms, they’re generally fabricated using a combination of traditional integrated circuit technologies and more sophisticated methods that manipulate both silicon and other substrates in a manner that exploit their mechanical properties.
In bulk micromachining, the substrate is removed in a manner similar to traditional integrated circuit techniques.
Surface micromachining, by comparison, is a predominantly additive in nature and is used to create more complex MEMS-based machinery. Material is deposited on the surface of the substrate in layers of thin films.
How far our safety regulations have come…
Dr Suzannah Lipscomb looks at the hidden dangers of the British post-war home. In the 1950s, people embraced modern design for the first time after years of austerity and self-denial. The modern home featured moulded plywood furniture, fibreglass, plastics and polyester — materials and technologies that were developed during World War II.
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WILLIAMSBURG, Va. (WTKR) — Habitat for Humanity made the first 3D printed home in the U.S. for a woman in Virginia.
“To have a home right before Christmas is really, really exciting,” homeowner April Stringfield said.
In July, crews broke ground on the 1,200-square-foot, three-bedroom concrete home.
