Notable & Newsworthy

May 2016

Jim Ahlgrimm has been a manager in the U.S. Department of Energy Wind and Water Power Technologies Office since 2002

DOE explores potential of wind to stabilize grids

When the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) commissioned a 1.5-megawatt (MW) wind turbine in 2009, it became a key player in our research to improve the performance and lower the costs of wind energy systems. In 2015, researchers at the National Wind Technology Center (NWTC) near our National Renewable Energy Laboratory (N

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05/24/2016

A diagram of the spectrum-splitting, four-junction mini-module developed at UNSW

UNSW engineers achieve milestone in solar cell efficiency

A new solar cell configuration developed by engineers at the University of New South Wales has pushed sunlight-to-electricity conversion efficiency to 34.5% – establishing a new world record for unfocused sunlight and nudging closer to the theoretical limits for such a device. The record was set by Dr Mar

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05/23/2016

One day products may be controlled exclusively through gestures

Google ATAP and Infineon advance their partnership in Soli radar tech

For the first time, two prototypes of products controlled exclusively through gestures were demonstrated at “Google I/O”, a smartwatch and a wireless speaker. Both devices can recognize gestures that replace switches or buttons with this revolutionary concept. Infineon Technologies and Google ATAP enabled the

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05/23/2016

Stratobus concept image

Solar-powered stratospheric snooper enters development stage

A French weapons manufacturer is developing a stratospheric airship, dubbed the Stratobus, that could act as a high-altitude eye in the sky for government agencies around the world. The €17 million grant from a French government investment program will go towards what Thales Alenia Space described as a

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05/18/2016

Imec expands its silicon platform for quantum computing

At the Quantum Europe conference, taking place in Amsterdam, Belgian’s nanoelectronincs research center imec announced that it is ramping-up its R&D activities focused on quantum computing. Imec will implement qubits and supporting nanoelectronic functionality for quantum computing, leveraging its advanced si

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05/17/2016

IQE and imec demonstrate 650 V GaN-on-Si power diodes on 200 mm wafers

Imec, a leading nanoelectronics research center, announced a strategic partnership on GaN-on-Si (Gallium Nitride-on-Silicon) technology with IQE, a leader in designing and manufacturing advanced semiconductor wafer products and services. GaN technology offers faster switching-power devices with higher breakdown vo

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05/16/2016

Top: Fermi contours with Rashba splitting, and non-equilibrium spin accumulation resulting from a shift of Fermi contours by spin injection. Bottom left: Experimental setup for the spin pumping measurement. Bottom right: Schematic of spin-to-charge current conversion at the Cu/Bi2O3 interface. Spin currents are generated by spin pumping from a Py layer in ferromagnetic resonance to a Cu layer and reach a Cu/Bi2O3 interface. Then, the spin-to-charge current conversion occurs owing to the spin-momentum locking at the Rashba interface.

JSAP researches spin currents at metal-oxide interfaces for magnetic memories

Devices based on spin currents rather than charge currents, offer interesting technological opportunities, such as future high-density, ultrafast and low-power magnetic memory devices. Conversion between charge and spin currents is key for exploiting such “spintronics”. Researchers at the University of Tokyo an

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05/16/2016

The sodium–carbon dioxide battery could power vehicles in Mars' CO2-rich atmosphere or recycle exhaust CO2 in a hybrid car

First rechargeable sodium–carbon dioxide battery created

The first rechargeable sodium–carbon dioxide battery has been created with the help of a nanostructured cathode. The cheap and potentially powerful battery could fuel Mars vehicles as the red planet’s atmosphere is 96% carbon dioxide or recycle carbon dioxide emissions on Earth. Sodium–carbon dioxide b

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05/14/2016

Energy split in the US

IEEFA says wind on the rise, coal on the wane

As coal dependence falters in the U.S., wind-powered electricity generation is on the rise. In less than a decade, the mix of fuels used for generating electricity has gone a major shift. Twelve states, most of them in the wind-rich Great Plains or the upper Midwest, are getting more than 10 percent of their po

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05/13/2016

Solliance realizes first up-scaled Perovskite-based PV modules with 10% efficiency

Solliance demonstrates a record 10% aperture area power conversion efficiency for its up-scaled thin-film perovskite photovoltaic modules. The efficiency was measured on an aperture area of 168 cm2. Twenty-five cells were serial connected through an optimized P1, P2, P3 interconnection technology. The PV module wa

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05/09/2016

Prof. Choi and his Ph.D. student Kun Joong Kim

Pohang University researchers create advanced miniaturized fuel cell

Drones are used for various applications such as aero picturing, disaster recovery, and delivering. Despite attracting attention as a new growth area, the biggest problem of drones is its small battery capacity and limited flight time of less than an hour. A fuel cell developed by Pohang University's Prof. Gyeong Man

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05/04/2016

Electrochemical performances of full lithiated silicon-sulfur battery built from 3D cpS-G networks cathode and 3D lithiated Si-G anode. a) Schematic illustration of a new configured lithiated silicon-sulfur battery onto 3D graphene networks. b) Selected voltage profiles of lithiated silicon-sulfur battery from 1st to 100th at 0.27 A g-1 based on the total mass of cathode and anode). c) Selected voltage profiles of lithiated silicon-sulfur battery at various current densities from 0.27 to 2.7 A g-1. d) Rate capabilities of Si-S battery and e) long cycle performances of full lithiated silicon-sulfur battery built on 3D graphene

Researchers develop silicon-sulfur battery built on 3D graphene

Researchers at Beihang University in Beijing have developed a new Li-sulfur battery using honeycomb-like sulfur copolymer uniformly distributed onto 3D graphene (3D cpS-G) networks for a cathode material and a 3D lithiated Si-G network as anode. In a paper published in the RSC journal Energy & Environme

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Date:

05/04/2016